


Altered History: Time Trials

by TKelParis



Series: Altered History [4]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005), Doctor Who: Eighth Doctor Adventures - Various Authors
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-25
Updated: 2019-01-04
Packaged: 2019-09-27 08:24:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 37,785
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17158607
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TKelParis/pseuds/TKelParis
Summary: Eight does not want to answer a mysterious – and diverted – call to come to The Library, but Donna won't let him shirk his duty. Yet the dangers there echo ones from the past, and the Doctor has never been so close to sinking into his darkest elements. Never mind the time stalker he's barely missed meeting before. Or did he?Rating: T/M (dark Doctor, character death, extreme danger)Disclaimer: Utterly not mine. Just taking things from canon, mixing in Big Finish stories, and a healthy dose of my imagination.Dedication: cassikat, for getting me interested in the Eighth Doctor in the first place. tardis_mole for being an awesome beta. And basmathgirl for encouraging me to continue the series and keep posting. Started posting in honor of Serenitys_Lady's birthday.





	1. History Section

**Author's Note:**

  * For [cassikat](https://archiveofourown.org/users/cassikat/gifts), [Serenitys_Lady](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Serenitys_Lady/gifts).



> Author's Note: Started during NaNoWriMo when I suddenly found “Echos on Oodsphere” finishing two chapters sooner than I expected (leaving one flashback bit out in the original draft), and to keep me going. I had to figure out on the fly what else I needed to write, and figured out later where the ideas would fit.
> 
> Once again, please make sure you've read the earlier installments: The Runaway Bride, Prophecies and Pompeii, and Echos on Ood Sphere. Otherwise you'll have no context for why Donna is travelling with Eight.
> 
> One other challenge for me was to ensure that I was not going overboard in my treatment of River Song. In full disclosure, she has rubbed me the wrong way since the first time I watched the Library episodes. I've made efforts in writing to make myself like her more, and I find that at a fundamental level she is someone I would not want to know or have in my life. (Even with the occasional instances where I almost want to root for her.) In this story I also hit upon what I feel is the biggest reason to not trust her, but... to quote her, “Spoilers”. Keep reading to find out. I have made some effort to include Big Finish info, but even that adds to the reasons I cannot like River. (Hey, no one will like every Doctor Who character. We can make an effort to accept that they exist, and that may be the best anyone can ask of us.)
> 
> And as always, a big thank you to tardis-mole for beta reading. You keep my historical info on track, and help me weed out those Americanisms that stand out like Six's coat in a sea of... any color. Never mind stop me when I need to be stopped on some tangent.

The TARDIS was quiet, waiting for her Thief and Heartfire to return. Her systems were running normally and she kept alert to any threats. All seemed in its place, even if they were taking longer than expected.

 

Suddenly the inner doors burst open and Donna marched in, her heels al-but stomping. It echoed all over the Control Room. “You are bonkers!”

 

The Doctor came in so quickly behind her, pausing only to push the doors into closing, that he looked like a gust in a hurricane. “Me?! Did you have to behave that way toward the Prime Minister of Katta Flo Ko?!”

 

Donna whipped around on a ha'penny, the golden flex of her eyes flashing like gunfire. “It was part of the plan, wasn't it? He needed to be distracted so that his plans for dominating the tourism for the Coral Reefs could be stopped. And he deserved to be shocked into his place. His plans ruined a perfectly good scuba diving trip! Making all the boats return early on a pretext. The sodding git _required_ a good slap. Are you going to scold me for doing something that the women of the planet cheered?”

 

“Hardly,” Eight snapped. During her rant he paced around the controls, trying to run scans before starting the dematerialisation sequence. “Men like that are the scourge of not just women but people in general. But did you have to choose that... that... _that_ dress?! I told you that he didn't deserve to see that much of you, and you deserve better than to have to be treated like someone trussed up to be leered at like meat.”

 

“Oi, are you getting at the stereotypes surrounding gingers?!”

 

“What?! Pazithi, no! No, no, no! You covered yourself with that cloak. If I'd seen what you were wearing under that-”

 

“You might be an alien who's old enough to be the father of my particular species, but you aren't my dad! And what's so wrong about this dress?” she demanded as she glanced down at it, waving a hand from her shoulders toward her legs. “It did the job and it's not like I'm exposing myself!”

 

The Doctor's eyes bulged at the visual cue to look back at her. Donna was wearing what could only be described as THE dress. The lower three-quarters hung freely from gathered high waist to the flared hem at half-thigh, in complete contrast to the upper-quarter, which hugged her like a second skin around her ample bosom. In fact, it not only enhanced the fact that Nature had smiled on her, bust-wise, but showed off a good portion of it to anyone unfortunate enough to have been facing her direction. He still could not figure out how that neckline could possibly be holding them in. And, the dress was black, which meant that anyone who wasn't facing her, looked anyway because orange and black together were attention-gatherers. The fact that it had a back to it offered the barest relief to the most offended, if that was the right word, man in the room: the Doctor himself. And he was suffering from what felt like sea-sickness just with the amount of thigh it granted his vision access to.

 

He once again took in the neckline and more words spilled out, like he thought she should have been. “That dress makes the wedding dress cleavage look tame. If anyone had thought you had a sizable chest before, that dress makes it look even bigger. I thought you didn't want to be looked at, given how you disguise your figure in your clothes.”

 

“Disguise?!”

 

“Don't you deny it! You've been so conditioned to think of yourself as bigger than you are that you hide your figure within clothes that don't flatter you. Or fit. I've seen what you wear between our adventures. Your figure was once the height of beauty on your planet, and the obsession with being so skinny that you cause paper-cuts if you're hugged will harm many in your time. Was there anyone in Chiswick who didn't make you feel like nothing?”

 

He could not understand why it was provoking so much emotion from him. Or why he was breathless. Or why his endocrine system had suddenly shifted up a couple of gears and was at peak performance.

 

“That's not the point here, Doctor!”

 

“Then what is, Donna?!”

 

“What right do you have to complain about what I wear? I've seen what you wore in earlier bodies!”

 

His eyes grew huge and his face slipped into panic. “How-How-How in Rassilon's name did you get to see those?! I didn't show you!”

 

“Your ship showed me.”

 

“What?! How?”

 

Donna shrugged. “I was looking up information in your library system about Gallifrey and you when she interrupted me with images that I think she had to have somehow taken. I doubt you would've wanted photos taken of you in those instances. Not that it's anywhere near the point. Why would you be so worried about what I wear? Didn't you say before we went on this little mission that Lucie used her flirting skills on some Swedish guard in the later 19th century?”

 

“Yes, but she was modestly dressed and the time-frame enforced good behavior. I pretended to be her guardian. All I had to do was glower at him for being alone with her and speak protectively toward Lucie.”

 

Donna rolled her eyes. “It's not like he actually got to touch me; I learned enough to know that he wouldn't as long as I remained in public, and I did.”

 

“Donna-!”

 

“And you've been doing this a lot lately, getting snappy when I seem to be in danger. Even before the Ood Sphere. Like when we met the so-called Alexander the Great. He was an obnoxious, pigheaded teenager on a hormone rampage!”

 

“He also had the right people serving him, and enough sense to listen to them. Although he nearly didn't where you were concerned.”

 

“Or how about when we landed in Greece during the 1920s revolution, where we had to work both our gobs to get Prince Phillip's family to safety?”

 

“They don't see many gingers there, and you were risking yourself needlessly!”

 

“Well, you kept limiting what I could do, and that made things harder for us all! Never mind when we had to intervene to prevent NASA from getting hold of a photo of an Ice Warrior!”

 

“Yes, and I've very nearly failed there at least three times on three separate and unrelated incidences. Well, if you're going to bring that up, how do you explain why you nearly married Prince Rudolph?! I told you something wasn't right about him!”

 

“If you had been listening to me, you would've realised that I respected your suspicions. I insisted that you accompany us to the Palace, didn't I?! And I only agreed to the whole thing because I suspected it was the only way we could figure out what was threatening the kingdom! And I was right! So what was all that about me leaving? I told you that I suspected something, and I didn't intend to remain there!”

 

The Doctor, flummoxed by her reminding him about their discussion, opened his mouth to retort nonetheless. But before any words came out, he shook like he got a sudden electric shock and his hand went to one of his pockets. “What the hell-?!”

 

“If you're trying to avoid this-”

 

“No, Donna. I felt a message come to the psychic paper,” he explained, drawing it out.

 

Her face relaxed into confusion. “I thought you said it only showed what you wanted people to see.”

 

“Or whatever they will believe,” he clarified as he opened it. His eyes narrowed. “What-What-What is this?” he breathed.

 

Donna, seeing that he was still from surprise, walked over to read it over his arm. When she did, her confusion turned into a mocking scowl as she read the words. “'The Library. Come as quick as you can.'” She then grabbed it from his hands. “A cry for help with a kiss?”

 

He blinked. “Is that what that 'X' means?”

 

Her lips twitched. “Well, that proves you don't know who sent it. And how many might be able to do that?”

 

“In theory, my people could, but they prefer a more direct method. Like a telepathic call or materialising inside my ship – no matter how briefly. And none of them would ever use that kind of emotion in a message.”

 

“There's not even coordinates or a date. And which library does this... person mean?”

 

A chime came from the TARDIS, like a bell ringing. The Doctor turned to the screen and paused as he brought up the readings. “She got the coordinates and the date already. Whoever sent the message sent those to the Old Girl directly.”

 

“Again, who could do that if it's not your people?”

 

“I don't know!” he snapped. “Whoever it is, it has to be a trap.”

 

“But what if there is some big danger and many are at risk? Would you let people die?”

 

“What if it means that I lose another companion?! I wasn't ready for you to nearly marry that Prince Rudolph, and I'm not ready for you to die!”

 

Donna's mouth popped open in a silent 'oi!', but no words came out.

 

Yet she was saved from answering when the TARDIS chimed again. This time they both turned and stilled at the sight of another message, this time through the screen:

 

' _Sorry to divert her message to you. It was meant for me, and I was originally supposed to send it to a different you – all because I had to keep the original time lines intact. Now to keep the new ones intact I must divert it even further back. You're the only one who can keep her at bay, and keep the future on course.'_

 

“'A different you'?” Donna repeated, disbelieving. “Does this person mean a future you? Who could it be?”

 

“I have a bad feeling that it's a future me. But it doesn't sound like someone I've met yet. Or have a memory of meeting. Time crashes seem to create memory blocks or I forget deliberately.”

 

“So this means in his past, you went to this place. Let me go and change before we're off.”

 

“No.”

 

“What?!” she squawked.

 

“You heard me. I can't trust whoever this person is who sent the cry for help. In fact, if it's who I think it might be, I definitely do _not_ want to meet her.”

 

She grabbed his arm and tried to make him face her. The action shocked him enough to give her time to talk uninterrupted. “But saving someone; that's what you do. You never deny a call for help, and when someone is reaching out for you specifically then they probably have a flipping good reason. Even if they're some Time Lord git with an agenda or some flirt who thinks they're special to you. You've shown me that your mission is to preserve Time, that it's in your very essence thanks to how your people were formed. If you can really see all that is, all that will be, and all that must not be, then prove it. Tell me, what do you see about this upcoming event? If there's another you, then you will survive it somehow. And if somehow it means I have to go-”

 

“I won't risk that!” he blurted, shaking his head.

 

“-then it's a price I'll accept to save you and the universe,” she continued over his protest. “It's a risk I accepted when I decided to change my mind and travel with you. You put yourself at risk because the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.”

 

He slowly turned to look at her, sinking in his boots. “Are you quoting Star Trek against me?”

 

“You appreciated and respected Spock's choice to sacrifice himself for the crew, even though you hated that it had to be done. Now, your other talent is snatching an alternative way out of an impossible situation. And you have me to help you spot the key details, put things together in ways your mind don't. So, I'm going to change clothes. When I get back here, I expect we'll have landed wherever and whenever this... suspicious messenger wants you to come. Run a bunch of scans while you wait for me, if that makes you feel better. Because you can't go about hiding from your fears; you can't run from yourself forever.”

 

He had no words as she marched into the corridor. He had enough experience to know that protesting further would not help. “If anything, protesting might earn another slap,” he muttered to himself. “I can't believe she didn't right then. She seemed mad enough for it.”

 

When he heard her close the door to her room he sighed as he began to send them to their destination. “What choice do I have? She's right. I do have a duty. But how can I keep her safe?”

 

After a few seconds of working at the controls, he paused. “And why is it so important to me?”

 

/=/=/=/=/=/

 

Donna finally returned, feeling better for feeling more like herself. Not that she didn't enjoy dressing up and feeling beautiful, but it wasn't easy overcoming the habits of a lifetime. She also wasn't ready to confront the Doctor on how stunned he had looked when he saw her black dress, which did have a rather daring neckline accentuated by a bow under the cleavage. Because there was a chance he would ask her why she had not shown him before, and being that way in front of him was unnerving for her.

 

The Doctor was going from place to place on the Controls. A frown marred his face, making the lines brought on by the stresses of his years since the Moment nearly killed him more evident.

 

“So where is this library?”

 

“Not a library. THE Library. It's a planet dedicated to books.”

 

“A whole planet?!”

 

“Yes,” he said, a bit of enthusiasm returning to his voice and face. “They have everything, including real books. There's nothing like that smell, Donna.”

 

“I agree. I worked in Hunslow Library for a while. Learned the Dewey system backwards and forwards. The newer books just don't smell right; they use different materials. When are we?”

 

“The 51st Century.”

 

“So... what's going on? Any signs of why we're here?”

 

“I'm not sure. The Old Girl's scans aren't showing me much more than that we arrived at Noon locally. I've been trying to figure out why and nothing seems wrong?”

 

Donna stilled. “So could be something interfering?”

 

“Most likely. But what?”

 

“It... couldn't be... She-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named?”

 

His lips twitched into a smile. “Read Harry Potter?”

 

“I have young cousins. Took them to the movies that've come out so far in my time. You must've seen them all, then. Even the ones not yet made.”

 

“Actually, not yet. Read them all, though. But as far as I can tell she can only influence certain things related to the TARDIS, and attempts to influence my thinking and what I'm aware of. But I know she's making the effort, so that doesn't work for long.”

 

“So... if we can't get more information from the TARDIS, is it time to investigate?”

 

He sighed. “Yes. Come on,” he said, putting on a brave face as he slung his satchel strap over his head and opened the doors for her. Still, he exited the outer doors first, just to be on the safe side. It also allowed him to be scanning with both the sonic and his scanner.

 

Donna took in the obvious reception area. “It looks like the most high tech library from my time, but on steroids.”

 

“A good description,” he remarked as he approached one computer terminal. “Let's see where everyone is.”

 

He ran the scan, and the results made them both start.

 

“Why does that say there's no one here? Is it a Sunday?” Donna asked.

 

“Well, that's if you search for humanoid forms or other similar life-signs, it comes up empty. But what if I expend it to any kind of life...?” His eyes widened as the number quickly rose and then halted. “At least a million million, but it's silent in the Library.”

 

“Doctor, you know that phrase about getting lost in a book? That's not literally possible here, is it?” she asked, a tremor in her voice.

 

He looked at her, and then they both looked at some nearby books.

 

“Welcome!”

 

“Ah!” they both squawked, turning to see one of the freestanding columns turning to reveal a male face in the white surface.

 

“What is that?!” Donna cried.

 

“A Node,” the Doctor answered.

 

“Why does it have a face?”

 

“This face was donated by Mark Chambers on the occasion of his death,” the face continued. “It has been selected from the databanks for your enjoyment.”

 

Donna took a step back, barely noticing that the Doctor was in her way and he had to grab her arms to keep her from falling. “It chose a dead face it thought I'd like?!”

 

“Donna, we'll talk about that in a bit. Um, hello, there! And you are?”

 

“I am Courtesy Node 710/aqua. Please enjoy the Library and respect the personal access codes of all your fellow readers regardless of species or hygiene taboo. Additional. There follows a brief message from the head librarian for your urgent attention. It has been edited for tone and content by Felman Lux Automated Decency Filter. Message follows. 'Run. For God's sake, run. Nowhere is safe. The Library has sealed itself, we can't... Oh, they're here. Arg. Slarg. Snick.' Message ends. Please switch off your mobile comm units for the comfort of other readers.”

 

“So that's why we're here,” the Doctor muttered, suspicions rising. “Any other messages, same time and date stamp?”

 

“One additional message,” the Node continued. “This message carries a Felman Lux coherency warning of 5.0.11...”

  
“Yes, yes, yes, fine, fine, fine, just play it,” he groaned.

  
“Message follows. 'Count the shadows. For God's sake, remember... if you want to live, count the shadows.' Message ends.”

 

The Doctor breathed sharply into his nose and grabbed Donna's hand at the same time.

 

“Doctor?” she asked.

 

“Donna, stay out of the shadows. Whatever you do, don't let a shadow touch you.”

 

“Why? You don't think whoever sent this has their own agenda?”

 

“No, but this isn't the last time I got a message to come somewhere with little information. Or the first time I've run into this kind of a threat.”

 


	2. Locum Doctor House Call

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A flashback chapter. Par for the course for this series.
> 
> Once again, please make sure you've read the earlier installments: The Runaway Bride, Prophecies and Pompeii, and Echos on Ood Sphere. Otherwise, you'll have no context for why Donna is traveling with Eight.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry I missed posting this yesterday. I had an early flight back to my place, and I was exhausted. By the time I remembered my goal to post this chapter the site was down.

_Planet Unpronounceable in English_

_The Distant Future_

 

The Doctor entered the TARDIS, lips tightly pursed and his steps louder than usual. He closed the doors himself, not waiting for the TARDIS to do anything for him.

 

Once done, he leaned against them and sighed aloud. “Who is that person who keeps following me? I know I've seen them before, but why can't I remember? I think it's a woman, but how can I be certain? Did she do something to me? I should be able to remember someone like her, so why can't I? There are only a few things that could interfere with a Time Lord's memories, and if she has one of them then I have to find a way to stop her before she can try it again.”

 

He drew out his scanner and smiled grimly. “At least I got her scanned from a distance. Human, and yet something is inconsistent with typical Humans – even accounting for time travel. Which she must be. She must be masking herself somehow. Hmm...”

 

On a hunch, he hurried to the screen and hooked the scanner to the readings. “Come on, Old Girl. Am I right? Have I seen her before?”

 

The TARDIS read the scans and compared with her databanks compiled from their numerous adventures. It took a few minutes, which felt like a lifetime even to him, but she produced something that answered his questions.

 

He groaned. “Whoever she is, she's somehow met each of me who's existed before? But what did she do? Why can't you show me? And what is she?!”

 

The chimes switched from high to low, sounding more like what Human ears might register as speech than anything she had ever produced before.

 

The Doctor pushed away from the panels. “Looks like a certain someone doesn't want me to know. Might even be connected. Or perhaps because my life doesn't run linear to the universe, I effectively haven't met her yet and the memories won't arrive in my psyche until after the first event in linear time.” He took a deep breath. “Well, I know things I didn't before. That means I'm on the alert.”

 

Something caught his attention in the corner of his eye. It looked like movement. He turned and stilled. “Who the hell are you two?!”

 

Indeed, two females in Time Lord robes stood before him several meters away. Both seemed young, like they were just out of the Academy or perhaps in their final years. The one on the left had wavy ginger locks past her shoulders, and blue eyes that seemed to sparkle with golden energy in the light. The other, now she seemed a bit more familiar but in the echo way that kept hitting him every few adventures. Dark hair and a face that – while not quite right – reminded him of his Fifth incarnation.

 

“You are needed on Earth,” said the ginger. “December 24th, 2005. This will take you there.” She drew out an oversized watch with a huge strap and held it toward him.

 

The Doctor eyed it with narrowed eyes. “What is that?”

 

“A Vortex Manipulator. It's been invented in your time, but you missed the memo.”

 

Her word choices made his brows tighten. 'Memo' was not a word a Time Lady used, even if she had been around Humans. “Why not use my ship?”

 

“Because another version of her is already there,” answered the dark-haired girl. “Neither she nor the Doctor is well, and you must be the one to help.”

 

“Why?”

 

“Because that is what Ohila warned us about,” she continued.

 

“Okay... I suppose that must be taken seriously. Do you have any proof?”

 

“That wouldn't qualify as spoilers?” asked the ginger.

 

He groaned. “Yes, yes, yes. I can tell that you're from the future. Please, I just ran into-”

 

The dark-haired girl nodded. “Someone your instincts are right to distrust. Shame, because she had potential. Best that the High Council never got their hands on her, I suppose. Especially during what could have been the Time War.”

 

The ginger turned a glare on her companion, who shrank. It was clear who was in charge of the two.

 

The Doctor had enough. “Do you both mind? I'm waiting.”

 

“One of those times from the old timeline happened, and now our Doctor is in a danger that we dare not approach as we were told you were there instead. Ohila instructed us to prepare for this day, and give you this,” the ginger continued. “Please, take it. I programmed the coordinates.”

 

“Will I be allowed to keep it?”

 

“Not yet. It has to return to our Doctor's time,” the dark-haired girl explained. “And you'll need the items in here.”

 

His eyes widened as she pulled out a bag and placed in on the floor. Her companion placed the Manipulator on top as he asked, “A medical bag?”

 

“Trust us: you will want these,” the ginger said, straightening. “And please, do keep your instincts in check. A certain someone has to live or some of your future won't quite proceed correctly.”

 

Then they both vanished.

 

The Doctor glanced at the controls. “They were... here and yet not here. They projected their minds here, and were able to transmat the items through the Vortex. Impressive in someone so young, and yet for two at once that is unheard of. A mystery that I have no time to solve, because I now sense that something is very wrong.”

 

He quickly set the TARDIS down on an empty planet, with no meteor activity or any signs of potential life. He promptly detached the portable scanner. “There, that will keep you safe. Let's see what they want me to do.”

 

Once he reached the bag, he picked up the Manipulator and checked inside the bag. “Well, the items look right for what my apparent cover will be,” he noted as he found some ID badges for the era. “UNIT advisor badge? Oh, this won't be good. Well, there's nothing for it.”

 

He put on Manipulator on his wrist, picked up the bag, and made sure his sonic was in his pocket – along with his usual scanner. With that confirmed, he activated the obvious button and vanished.

 

/=/=/=/=/

 

The Doctor reappeared behind some trees, out of the sight of any possible watchers. He closed his eyes and took several deep breaths. “Oh, that's only a bit better than a Time Ring. At least this has some scanning ability in it.”

 

He drew out his sonic and scanned the area. “Okay, East London. And there's a sign that says 'Powell Estates'. So why here? And where is the Old Girl?”

 

Soon he found her, around a corner and standing all alone in what seemed like a courtyard of sorts. He ran to the doors and touched the outside. “Yes, it's his TARDIS. I recognize those marks. Why are you so quiet, Old Girl?”

 

He tried his key, and was shocked that the lock morphed enough to let him in. The drastic difference from his own TARDIS' design still unsettled him, but something else caught his attention quickly. “What is this?! Your panel's damaged! Someone ripped you open. Oh, no, no, no! Please don't tell me it's who I think it is!”

 

His sonic alerted him. “Someone's approaching. Oh! He'll have answers!”

 

He rushed outside and closed the doors, knowing that they would lock behind him. Sure enough, the young man running up was very familiar. Enough that the Doctor managed a small smile. “Mickey Smith, hello. Do you know where the Doctor is?”

 

Mickey slowed down to a stop in front of him. “Um, yeah. He's in Jackie's place, unconscious.”

 

“Oh, that is not good. Take me to him. I can help.”

 

“Sure.”

 

“And quickly!”

 

Mickey started in a jog, and the Doctor easily kept up. “I have to ask,” said the young Human. “He said that his ship got stuck on a certain setting and he liked it. If yours is also in the same design on the outside... are you two related?”

 

The Doctor let out a little laugh as he thought about what he could say. The fewer who knew who he was, the better. But he sensed something about Mickey Smith that told him that he needed the chance to shine, and had been treated poorly by Rose. So perhaps a little more honesty was called for. Especially since the young man had the sense to keep his voice low. “Well, yes. You can't tell Rose any of this, not until the Doctor you know says it's in his interest for her to know, but it's more than that. He's a future version of me.”

 

Mickey stumbled over his feet and stared at him. “You mean you do change bodies within the same spot?”

 

That made the Doctor stop to face him. “How do you know that? I know that Rose didn't hear that bit from Clive.”

 

“No, she didn't. But I looked him up when she was off with the Doctor. I told him I wanted answers about who she had gone off with, and although he didn't have anything left he told me what he remembered. Given that the man who came out with Rose looks taller and younger, I guess you are phoenixes.”

 

“Of a sort. It's not something we speak of in public,” the Doctor hedged. “But you're a smart person, so I'll explain. It's called regeneration. If the future me is unconscious, and he must be if the TARDIS is that quiet, it must have been a bad one. Where exactly is he?”

 

“Um... Rose pressed us into taking him into her room.”

 

Eight's eyes went huge and his face paled. “Take me there now!”

 

Luckily Mickey led him right up a flight of stairs and to a door, which he unlocked immediately as he had the key out. The Doctor pushed past him and thundered inside.

 

“What's going on, Mickey?” cried an unfamiliar woman's voice, just beating the source to his sight. Her blonde hair and something subtle in her face told who she was. She held a pair of pyjamas in her arms.

 

“Jackie Tyler?” Eight demanded.

 

“Yes. Who are you?” she asked, taken aback and yet snappish.

 

He held out the badge he thought would work best, the UNIT badge. “You have a person in your place I need to treat immediately. Where is he?”

 

Her eyes went huge. “Okay, this way.” She led him promptly to a closed door.

 

Eight pushed past her and opened the door. What he saw made him shout, “Hands off!”

 

Rose sprung away from the unmoving male on the bed. Her hands had been drawing his jumper up his chest, and the leather jacket was on a side dresser. “What are you doing here?!”

 

“Step away from the patient,” Eight insisted, walking firmly into the room.

 

“He's my friend-” she started, stepping between him and the bed.

 

“And he's that way because of something you did, I assume. I saw the state of the TARDIS. He's ill and she's ill with him. You know nothing of treating a Time Lord,” he whispered loudly.

 

“Rose, you know him?” asked Jackie.

 

“He saved us from that place under the London Eye,” Mickey interjected. “Treated me nicely. And the Doctor trusted him. That's enough for me.”

 

“Mum, he's like the Doctor in one way,” Rose insisted.

 

“I'm also his physician,” Eight interrupted.

 

“You are?” Jackie said, intrigued. “So you know how to help him?”

 

“You're a physician?” Rose scoffed.

 

Eight drew out the credentials. “Read it and weep. John Smith, Locum Doctor. And if that isn't enough...” He held out the other badge. “See this? This says I'm a UNIT advisor and have the right to call for help. Get in my way and I will have him taken away from here where he can recover in peace.”

 

Rose trembled but did not move. “I'm not leaving him.”

 

“You're an underage child still, thanks to his taking you away. That's how UNIT will see it, and they take a dim view of anyone who assaults their operatives.”

 

“Rose!” Jackie scolded. “I told you to leave it to Mickey.”

 

“Those clothes aren't suited for him anymore,” Rose protested. “I'm doing him a favour!”

 

“One he and his kind would not welcome. Now, Rose Tyler, for once in your life shut up and listen to an adult!”

 

The Doctor knew he was playing with fire, but he was certain of one thing: this was not the time that the Moment would strike. There was no way that his future self would have put his life on the line if he had not believed he had neuralized the threat for the time being. And he knew that striking now would not fit within the Time Demon's plans.

 

Rose's mouth dropped and her eyes went enormous. Her jaw moved, but no sound came from her lips.

 

Jackie sighed and put down the clothes. “Can I borrow you for a bit? That's the quietest she's been since she turned 16.”

 

Eight ignored the intrigue in her voice. “I'll be remaining with him. So... Mickey, take Rose out shopping. I need the following items,” he said, drawing out a pad of paper and quickly jotting things down.

 

Mickey accepted it, and blinked.

 

“Rose, do not return without them,” Eight warned as he also handed Mickey some money hidden in the bag. “What are you waiting for? I have a patient to examine and no one can be present!”

 

Rose closed her mouth, glaring at him but she stomped out of the room, grabbing her coat from the back of the door. “Come on, Mickey!” she snapped as she exited.

 

“Sorry,” Eight whispered to Mickey, aware that the young man would be dealing with a viper. And that they would discover that at least one item was not yet available. It was meant as a diversion to keep her away until Eleven could be stabilized.

 

Mickey shrugged. “Been here before,” he muttered before he followed her. He was already dressed for the cold weather outside, after all.

 

Once he heard both voices leave and the door close, he drew out the medical probe. “Mrs. Tyler, please leave the room.”

 

“Jackie, please. And just answer me this: did Rose really cause this to happen to him?”

 

Eight looked at her. “How much do you know about what your daughter has been doing?”

 

“The Doctor says he's a time traveler, an alien,” Jackie said, quietly. “I wasn't happy with her disappearing for a year, but it seems that wasn't his intention. He told me he knows what it's like being a parent, and promised to do whatever he could to help Rose grow up. I've tried, but I... I lost my husband when Rose was a baby. My friends said I was being too nice to her, trying to make up for not having a dad. That I molly-coddled her after Jimmy Stone hurt her, and overcompensated to the point of allowing her to continue playing the victim.” She sniffled. “Suppose they were right.”

 

“Not every child who endures that turns out the way Rose has,” Eight said, stopping her mid-thought. “The past has happened, but you can show that you've had enough.”

 

“Easier said than done. Staying here and having a job, or flying about the universe and time? She hardly calls. I don't think she respects me anymore.” She sniffled. “If she ever did.”

 

Eight sighed, feeling so sorry for her. “Well, Jackie, I think you're owed some answers. While I don't know for sure what happened after the TARDIS was torn open, I do know that the ship is injured. She and the Doctor are closely bound together. That's how our kind work when we travel like this. She's injured, I'm injured. At least there's not a connection through time itself,” he added on a mutter.

 

“Wait... Mickey mentioned meeting you. He said... that he thought you two were more closely connected than just the same species. If the Doctor I knew could change into this... then who are you to him?”

 

He eyed her for a minute while he ran the medical probe over his future self. He had already noted the younger features and the overall appearance, and only knew that he had a Time Crash with him at some point in the past. “An earlier version. Which makes me being here problematic. Although I tend to forget details surrounding when I meet a future me. And as I told Mickey, you can't tell Rose any of this until the me lying there says he's ready for her to know.”

 

Jackie collapsed into a nearby chair. “Really? So... can you touch him?”

 

“Ah, you're thinking of a science fiction. No, different mes can touch. But the same me? No. Someone cannot touch their earlier or future self of the same regeneration.” He looked at the readings. “Weakness in the back, wrist missing some tendons, brainwaves disrupted but both hearts working.”

 

“Both hearts?!” she squawked, just barely keeping quiet. “Anything else you got two of?!”

 

He blinked at her as he put away the probe. “Is there some joke in that?”

 

Then the Doctor in the bed inhaled deeply, and exhaled a cloud of air. The golden midst floated through the ceiling and out of sight.

 

Eight paled. “Oh, I hope no other species sees that. With the TARDIS effectively out of commission Earth could be in deep trouble if danger comes.”


	3. Horrible Histories

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Back to the Library. Short chapter.

_From Chapter One:_

 

“ _Message follows. 'Count the shadows. For God's sake, remember... if you want to live, count the shadows.' Message ends.”_

 

_The Doctor breathed sharply into his nose and grabbed Donna's hand at the same time._

 

“ _Doctor?” she asked._

 

“ _Donna, stay out of the shadows. Whatever you do, don't let a shadow touch you.”_

 

“ _Why? You don't think whoever sent this has their own agenda?”_

 

“ _No, but this isn't the last time I got a message to come somewhere with little information. Or the first time I've run into this kind of a threat.”_

 

 

_The Library_

_51st Century_

 

Donna sucked in a breath and looked around.

 

“Back to the TARDIS!” the Doctor blurted.

 

“Doctor! Where did those shadows come from?!”

 

His eyes went to where Donna's were fixed on. A darkness was moving slowly through one of the aisles, and had come between them and the TARDIS.

 

“Thank the Eternals I closed the doors and added additional protections. Run!”

 

They rushed into a nearby corridor, out of the entry area. “What the hell is that?!” Donna gasped as they slowed in a well-lit area, although not as lit as the entry.

 

The Doctor drew a torch out and tested it. “Good. Strong light. Here.”

 

Donna accepted it in her free hand. “Doctor, answer my question.”

 

“I will, as long as you keep moving,” he promised as he drew out a torch that glowed even brighter.

 

They walked carefully, and he began his tale.

 

“Back in my Fourth incarnation, I was travelling alone and decided to go to a place called Funworld. What I didn't know was that it wasn't open yet, and all the workers had died. It used to be a forest world, and they cut down all the trees to make way for an amusement park.”

 

“That's awful! All of them?!”

 

“Well, I don't recall a single one remaining. They also took out all the life they could detect. Except they failed scan for life smaller than the eye can see. That's what you just saw. Vashta Nerada. I've encountered them one other time, in this body, when I answered a distress call too soon.”

 

“What does the name mean? What are they when they're at home? And where do they come from?”

 

He looked around for a clear path around the cloud, to hopefully make them leave first. “It's a transliteration into a language you can speak. 'The shadows that melt the flesh' is what the name means. No one knows for certain which world was their homeworld. I think some time traveler picked a few up and accidentally spread them across many worlds.”

 

“Not Earth, surely?”

 

“Yes, Donna. But they started as just scavengers, eating dead creatures in the dark. They used to avoid the light completely, and never swarmed like this. But after having the experience of bipeds destroying their habitat? They can spread knowledge and they have emotions, that much I know from the first adventure. And I think they're a hive consciousness.”

 

“Think?” Donna asked, sharply.

 

“That came from a psychic who came with the team that went to the first world, and she could sense them – with difficulty.”

 

“What happened to her?”

 

The Doctor's face fell. “Died. They ate her.”

 

Donna's breathing speed increased. “So they're like the Racnoss? They eat people?”

 

“Now they do. But there was a cordon placed on Funworld. Only one risk-taking woman dared to return, and she somehow collected some for experimentation and modification.”

 

“What the flipping heck did she think they would do?”

 

“She wanted to turn them into helpful beings for medical purposes, but someone sabotaged the experiments, which were being supported by my own people.”

 

“What?!”

 

“Believe me, I had words with Romana about it before we left. Ollistra had just returned, and I imagine that she had a lot of explaining to do. It was set in preparation for the potential Time War.”

 

“But you averted it. Didn't they stop it?”

 

“Not all of Gallifrey supported the peace created by my actions, Donna. You noticed that, surely.”

 

“Yeah, but wouldn't the Time Lords know the danger involved in working with those beings?”

 

“I think with my destroying the ancient weapons, they wanted something in reserve. They supported weaponising the Vashta Nerada.”

 

“Okay,” Donna breathed. “That is a bit-”

 

“Donna!” he cried suddenly, drawing her against him.

 

“Oi, hands!”

 

“Donna, look!”

 

She looked where she had been. “Where's that shadow coming from?”

 

“Your shadow came too close to it. And it's coming closer. Run!”

 

They bolted through the halls, and this time a larger swarm followed. At length, they ran into a dead end. A closed double door.

 

“Open it!” Donna screamed.

 

“The sonic takes a while to do wood,” he breathed, fighting against the settings.

 

“Oh, move over!” she snapped, pushing him out of the way. She kicked the door at the connecting point and the doors flew open in response.

 

“Inside!” he cried. They rushed in and closed the doors. He used a book to block the doors.

 

“Will that be enough?”

 

“I hope so. I've seen them break through other things, but I doubt this swarm has that experience. Still, we're not staying here long. Oh!”

 

Donna turned and saw what had caught his attention. A ball floated in the air, a little light coming off it.

 

“Hello, I'm the Doctor and this is Donna. Sorry we burst in like that, but may we stop here for a bit?”

 

The ball suddenly fell to the ground.

 

“What is it?” Donna asked.

 

“A security camera. It switched itself off,” he answered as he knelt. He drew out the sonic and ran it over it. “Excellent door skills, Donna.”

 

“Yeah, well, you know, boyfriends. Sometimes you need the element of surprise.” She sighed. “Not to mention escape.”

 

“Why would you need either?” he asked, looking up in horror.

 

She shrugged. “So I made bad choices in my boyfriends. At least none of them actually hurt me. Back to the present. What is a little shop doing here?”

 

“Even Libraries have a little shop,” he answered. “Ha!” He got the camera open.

 

Not three seconds later, text scrolled across the screen. Donna could read it from her angle: 'No, stop it. No. No.'

 

“Oh, sorry,” the Doctor breathed, putting it down slowly and closing the little door.

 

“You said it was a security camera.”

 

“Yes, it is. And it's alive.”

 

Then the saw more text scrolling across: 'Others are coming. The Library is breached. Others are coming.'

 

“Oh, no,” he groaned. “This is just like Funworld!”

 

“Doctor, did anyone survive there?”

 

“Aside from me, no.”

 

Donna paled, her freckles suddenly looking much darker.

 

“And the last time only that other Time Lord and myself survived. Donna, we have to find a way out, I can't let you become one of them!”

 

“Reminder,” a Node said, turning to show a woman's face this time. “The library has been breached. Others are coming.”

 

“We have to find a way out of here,” the Doctor said, looking around.

 

Over his words, the Node continued, “Reminder. The library has been breached. Others are coming. Reminder. The library has been breached-”

 

The Doctor and Donna recoiled as a door on the other side of the room blasted open. As the smoke cleared, the Node stopped speaking. One by one, six figures in white spacesuits walked in. Their faces were concealed by a polarizing lens on each helmet.

 

One figure walked right up in front of the Doctor, who took a step back. Donna glanced at him long enough to notice his nostrils flare, as if he smelled something that set him on edge. As if the situation weren't bad enough on its own. But she wondered who these people were.

 

The figure reached up to touch a button on the helmet, and suddenly they could see a female face with a hint of curly blonde hair visible. She smiled, and opened her mouth.

 

“You.”

 

She and Donna both started. It did not come from either of them. It came from the Doctor. Not even when he had been about to unleash the Oncoming Storm on her mother or when the Sybil's followers were about to kill her did he have such venom in his voice.


	4. Fish and Fights

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Back at the Tyler flat, Eight is not having a good Christmas Eve.

_Powell Estate_

_December 24, 2005_

 

Eight hoped that he would treat Jackie right once he became Ten. Because she was a treasure and didn't see it. He wondered how much was due to upbringing and how much was due to circumstances. Such as early widowhood and motherhood to a child who was problematic at best.

 

He hoped that he would find some proof that Rose Tyler and the Moment were not connected. Then he could accept what he had to do later in his lives with greater calm.

 

It was now quite dark, and no sign of Rose or Mickey had been heard. While he ran more thorough scans of his future self he had to refuse everything Jackie offered.

 

“What, not even tea?” she asked, throwing her hands up in the air on her coming in to announce she had made dinner. “This has to be the fifth time I've offered something.”

 

“Tea is good. Food, no,” he answered.

 

“Why not?”

 

He turned to face her, sighing through his nose. “Jackie, there are strict rituals surrounding my people in interactions involving food. When one person offers food to a person they are not related to it can, depending on the circumstances, be a marriage proposal.”

 

Her face pinched. “Blimey, no! No offence, but you're... not my type.”

 

“None taken.”

 

“Is that why the Doctor...” She hesitated to check that Rose was still out of the flat. She breathed a sigh of relief, yet still lowered her voice. “Sorry. This you, the Doctor,” she pointed towards the bed. “Is that why he refused to accept food from us? Rose admitted she offered to buy him fish n' chips and although she thought he said yes he didn't eat any of it.”

 

“He had to. Never mind that she's too young.”

 

“Well, thank god you're honourable. Not too many blokes wouldn't. Oh, the stories I could tell about that girl and the trouble she's been in. The number of times I've had to talk the authorities into not pressing charges beggars belief.”

 

He was not certain it was that big of a surprise, but he kept that thought to himself. “Has she been any better since she met him?”

 

“I thought you said-”

 

“Right now those answers might influence how I have to treat his symptoms. I've been warned to not take him away from here, but if I have to temporarily I will.”

 

Jackie thought a few seconds. “Well, she's more willing to put herself out there. Talks about doing the right thing, and sometimes even does. If someone else has a go at me she defends me.” She paused a few more seconds. “Hope it's not because she thinks that's her job, having a go at me.”

 

“By the way, what was that shuffling around noise I heard earlier? Didn't you already put up a Christmas tree?”

 

“Oh, another one was left on my door, so I brought it in. So much prettier. Thought Rose stopped by and left it. I had to move the old one into my room. No room anywhere else.”

 

Suddenly they could hear running outside, coming closer. Eight tensed.

 

Jackie groaned. “Rose. What is she up to?” she breathed as she walked into the living area.

 

Eight turned to focus on the latest scans of Eleven's brain activity. “Now what could trigger you to finish healing? It's like you're stuck.”

 

He heard Mickey and Rose burst into the flat. “Right, it's not safe, we've gota get out – where can we go?” Rose said, breathless.

 

“My mate Stan, he'll put us up,” Mickey answered, just as breathless.

 

“That's only two streets away,” he heard her muse. “What about Mo? Where's she living now?”

 

“What does it matter?” Jackie shouted. “And what's going on?! It's Christmas Eve! We're not going anywhere unless Dr. Smith says so! Now answer me!”

 

“Mum-” Rose cut herself off. “Where'd you get that tree? That's a new tree. Where'd you get it?”

 

“Well, I found it on the doorstep. I thought it was you!”

 

“How can it be me?!”

 

“Well, you went shopping, there was a ring at the door, and there it was!”

 

“No, that wasn't me,” Rose protested.

 

She sounded sincere. And her mother believed it, because her next words were, “Then who was it...?”

 

Then Eight heard a strange whirring sound, and three pairs of screams erupted from the living area before they piled into the bedroom. Mickey slammed the door behind them.

 

Eight stood. “What's going on?!”

 

“There was this Santa brass band, they attacked us!” Rose said. “Their horns blew fire and some sort of energy weapon!”

 

“And that tree out there just started spinning on its own, coming at us!” Mickey panted, stepping away from the door.

 

The noise outside grew louder, sounding vaguely like Jingle Bells but with added aggressive undertones.

 

Eight winced. “Oh, this will be a fun night.”

 

The door splintered open, forcing all to shield their faces from the debris. But the instant the spinning tree had cleared the doorway, Eight stood with his sonic in hand. A steady pulse from it and the tree stopped spinning. It crashed to the ground in a flattened pile of green plastic pine needles.

 

“There, that's that taken care of. Now, did these Santas follow you?”

 

“They were,” Mickey said. “I think we lost them.”

 

“Come with me,” Eight said, walking out of the room and scanning all-the-while. “That was powered by remote control. So what's controlling it?”

 

He was relieved that even Rose followed directions. Seemed her curiosity was stronger than her wish to stay by Eleven's side.

 

When he opened the door one sniff caught his attention. The wind was blowing just hard enough that he could pick up the faint whiff of alien life-signs. Stepping out to look over the railing, he saw three beings in Santa garb and masks. Sure enough, they aimed their horns at him.

 

“No, you don't!” he snapped, aiming the sonic.

 

Before it could pulse, the creatures backed away, lowering their weapons. Then they transmatted into nothing.

 

“Hmm, fascinating puzzle.” Eight lowered his sonic, but kept it at ready. “Creatures with teleportation capabilities, but they were not organic life forms. Where did they come from?”

 

“Pilot fish.”

 

Eight spun around at the sound of the unfamiliar voice. His eyes went huge. “How are you standing?!”

 

Eleven stood in the pyjamas Jackie had provided. Eight had chosen to change him – using the blankets to keep his future self's privacy intact – and hide the old clothes in his satchel, just for safekeeping access to the items kept inside. He had also put on the dressing gown left by Jackie, one Eight had wondered if it had belonged to the late Mr. Tyler. He stood stock still, looking steady and stern.

 

“Woke as you were all leaving. Anyway, they were just pilot fish.”

 

“What do you mean, 'just pilot fish'?” Mickey asked.

 

Before Eleven could answer, he gasped and collapsed to sitting.

 

Eight was at his side, helping him remain upright, before the others could move. “You woke too soon.”

 

“I'm still regenerating,” Eleven gasped. “I'm bursting with energy.” He released another exhale of golden energy.

 

“Wait,” Eight muttered. “What are those things?”

  
“You see?” Eleven continued, as if he had not heard the comment. “The pilot fish could smell it a million miles away. So they eliminate the defence, that's you lot, and they carry me off,” he explained to the Humans. “They could run their batteries on me for a couple of-ow!”

 

Jackie knelt on the other side, helping hold him upright. “Oh! Oh! Oh!”  


“My head!” Eleven moaned in pain, hands moving to hold it. “I'm having a neuron implosion. I need...”

  
“What do you need?” Jackie asked.

 

“Jackie, let me,” Eight interrupted. “Would Contact help?” he asked Eleven.

 

“I need...” Eleven did not get any further.

  
“Painkillers?” Jackie suggested.

  
Eight shook his head. “Those could kill him. Doctor, shall we attempt Contact?”

 

Eleven struggled to take breaths through the pain. “I can't concentrate enough. You would learn things you're not supposed to know yet.”

 

“What, does that mean, 'not supposed to know yet?” asked Rose.

 

“I need you Humans to shut up,” Eleven snapped, barely avoiding a shout.

  
Jackie scoffed. “Oh, he hasn't changed that much, has he?”

  
“We haven't got much time,” Eleven interrupted, sticking his hands into the pockets. “If there's pilot fish, then-” He frowned as he drew an item out. “Why's there an apple in my dressing gown?!”

  
“Oh, that's Howard. Sorry,” Jackie said.

 

“Your husband?” Eight asked.

 

“Bloody hell, no. Howard's my boyfriend.”

 

“He keeps apples in his dressing gown?” Eight interrupted with a frown.

  
“He gets hungry,” Jackie protested.

 

“What, he gets hungry in his sleep?” Eleven asked, disbelieving.

  
“Sometimes.”

  
“Argh!” Eleven cried before he could either carry on or change the subject, dropping the apple to the ground. “Brain collapsing. The pilot fish. The pilot fish mean that something, something, something is coming.” And he promptly sagged.

 

Eight caught him. “Jackie, help me.”

 

“No,” Rose protested. “I'm-”

 

“I said you were not to help. Touch him again while he's unconscious and I will summon UNIT against you.”

 

“What is your problem with me?!”

 

The truth could not be spoken, no matter how much he wanted to inquire if she wanted the answers in alphabetical order. If she was somehow _not_ the Moment reincarnated, then she did not need to know yet. And if she was, then she might risk a poor reaction – for everyone around her. So he thought fast.

 

“I don't like teenagers who play at being adults. I knew one teenager who was already closer to being an adult than you were, and gave me as much lip. Only her anger was somewhat justified.”

 

Rose moved to slap him, but Mickey grabbed her wrist. “You're a gate-crasher! You're probably castrated, as well!”

 

Eight laughed. The force surprised him, but he had to savor this. “That is the silliest accusation ever leveled at me! Not to mention the most narrow-minded.”

 

“Why not?! He flirted-”

 

“Rose, don't take your anger out on him!” Mickey hissed, trying to draw her back inside. “He helped save us, and the Doctor needs all the help he can get. Now let's get inside before we all catch a cold.”

 

Given that Rose stopped fighting him and walked inside without prompting, she valued the health of the man she knew as the Doctor. Which suited Eight perfectly. Thus he and Jackie worked together to move the taller him back into the bedroom.

 

As they laid him on the bed, Jackie had questions. “What can we do? What does he need? What's wrong with his brain?”

 

“The regeneration must have been particularly violent. When that happens all sort of things can go haywire internally. This level of brainwave problems means he needs something to set them right.” He glanced back towards the outer areas and then lowered his voice. “Normally I would need to know everything, but some things might not be best for me to know. I've never been this hampered in how to help him.”

 

“Do you have nothing in that bag of yours?” she asked, equally quiet.

 

“There are a few things I can try, but I'm not sure what will work.”

 

“Some physician you are,” Rose scorned, stepping in with Mickey behind her.

 

Eight ignored her and focused on Mickey, all the while looking inside the bag for what he could use. “What's the computer for?”

 

“Going to do some research,” the young man answered. “Jackie, I'm using the phone line. Is that all right?”  


“Yeah. Keep a count of it.” She sighed, head lifted as she went to turn on the TV in the other room. “Come on, Rose. Get out of the way. He's got medicines to try and it won't help the Doctor if you get keep insulting his friend.”

 

Rose's face was a storm fluctuating, but she looked at the much larger hurricane in the strange man's eyes and chose to not interfere. “Fine, but I'm staying right here.”

 

/=/=/=/=/

 

A while later, Eight had run every scan he could over Eleven's body. Jackie was in the other room, giving Eight the space he needed. Rose remained standing near Mickey, whose fingers flew across the laptop keyboard in his research. Although the young man had taken the time to hurry home, grab a bite to eat and then return,

 

Mickey paused and glanced at the time. “It's midnight. Christmas day. Any change?”

  
Eight shook his head. “He's worse. Just one heart beating. And that's an even bigger worry. With only one heart beating there will not be enough oxygen getting to his brain.”

  
From the other room they could hear the TV. “Scientists in charge of Britain's mission to Mars have re-established contact with the Guinevere One space probe. They're expecting the first transmission from the planet's surface in the next few minutes.”

  
“Yes, we are,” said another man's voice. “We're, we're back on schedule. We've received the signal from Guinevere One. The Mars landing would seem to be an unqualified success.”

  
“But is it true that you completely lost contact earlier tonight?” another man asked.

 

That got Eight's attention even as he focused on Eleven's dire condition.

 

“Yes, we had a bit of a scare,” the scientific person said. “Guinevere seemed to fall off the scope, but it, it was just a blip. Only disappeared for a few seconds. She is fine now, absolutely fine. We're getting the first pictures transmitted live any minute now. I'd better get back to it, thanks.”

  
“Here we go, pilot fish,” Mickey said, getting results. “Scavengers, like the Doctor said. Harmless. They're tiny. But the point is, the little fish swim alongside the big fish.”

  
Rose took her suspicious gaze off of Eight to look at the images Mickey found. “Do you mean like sharks?”

  
Mickey nodded. “Great big sharks. So, what the Doctor means is, we had them, now we get that.”

  
“Something is coming. How close?” Rose asked, a tremor cracking her voice.

  
“There's no way of telling, but the pilot fish don't swim far from their daddy.”

 

“A fair way of putting it,” Eight commented darkly.

  
“So, it's close?” she asked him.

  
“Funny sort of rocks,” they heard Jackie say.

 

Curious, and not sure what else to do for Eleven, Eight walked into the main area as he heard another voice say, “The first photographs.”

  
“That's not rocks,” Rose said, quiet.

  
The Newsreader continued, “This image is being transmitted via mission control, coming live from the depths of space on Christmas morning.”

  
The image was indeed not a rock at all. Instead the image of a red-eyed alien with a head like a goat's skull. It let out a series of growls and gurgles aimed at the probe.

  
“Oh, dear,” Eight murmured.

 

“What?” Jackie said, muting the TV. “You recognise that creature?”

 

“Another alien. You mentioned the 'daddy', Mickey? Well, you just saw one of them.”

 

“What are they?” Mickey asked before anyone else could.

 

“Sycorax. A warrior species from the outer reaches of the Sol System. If they're here then they mean to conquer the Earth. And we're down some key defences.”

 

He would not admit his fears then. Earth was screwed.


	5. Book of Song

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eight and Donna meet the Expedition. It doesn't go well, especially in one person's eyes.

_From Chapter Three:_

 

_The figure reached up to touch a button on the helmet, and suddenly they could see a female face with a hint of curly blonde hair visible. She smiled, and opened her mouth._

 

“ _You.”_

 

_She and Donna both started. It did not come from either of them. It came from the Doctor. Not even when he had been about to unleash the Oncoming Storm on her mother or when the Sybil's followers were about to kill her did Donna hear such venom in his voice._

 

 

_The Library_

_51st Century_

 

The newcomer stared at him in disbelief, her mouth slack.

 

Before anyone could speak, the Doctor did, voice as sharp as broken glass. “Leave. All of you, now!”

 

“Doctor,” Donna cautioned.

 

“This is too important,” he tossed over his shoulder as he moved past the woman and addressed the others. “All of you. Turn around, get back in your rocket and fly away. Tell your grandchildren you came to the Library and lived. They won't believe you.”

 

No one even moved in response. Except for the woman leading, who composed herself and casually said, “Pop your helmets, everyone. We've got breathers.”

  
“How do you know they're not androids?” another woman asked, in an American – Californian, if the Doctor's information was right – accent, through her helmet.

  
“Because I've dated androids. They're rubbish,” the first woman said after pulling off her helmet, revealing tightly pulled back blonde hair that would probably be fluffed up otherwise.

  
One man took off his visor impatiently. “Who is this?” he demanded of the leader. While he spoke he others all removed their helmets, provoking the Doctor to rub his face. Two men and two women revealed their faces. “You said we were the only expedition. I paid for exclusives.”

  
“I lied, I'm always lying. Bound to be others,” she said with a smirk.

 

“If that is the truth, then even that statement is a lie,” Donna said, drawing a startled look from the woman. “How can we trust someone who says that? How can we know what's a lie and what isn't? You're not putting yourself forward well, are you?”

  
The man turned to the third of the women. “Miss Evangelista, I want to see the contracts.”

  
The blonde, the first woman, walked towards the Doctor. “You came through the north door, yeah? How was that, much damage?”

  
He ignored her, walked away and addressed the man. “Please, just leave. I'm asking you seriously and properly, just leave.” He paused in his rant. “Wait, wait, wait. Did you say expedition?”

  
“My expedition. I funded it,” announced the man, imperiously.

 

The Doctor groaned. “Oh, you're not, are you? Tell me you're not archaeologists.”

  
The blonde's amusement radiated like a sun. “Got a problem with archaeologists?”

  
“I'm a time traveller,” he answered tightly, barely giving her a passing look. “I point and laugh at archaeologists. You're always getting things wrong and destroying far more than you 'save'. The chief identifying feature of archaeology is that you destroy a site to reveal a ruin. Not even modern scanners in this century are enough; too many of you still want to dig the site out, regardless of the cost to the site by yourselves or visitors. Pompeii was turned into a tourist attraction before the research was even halfway done. Uluru, for another example, is a native temple and non-natives were walking all over it and left rut marks across the top before the Native Council said that was enough and got legal backing to keep people out. The Druids needed to do the same for Stonehenge. And the only thing that annoys be more than archaeologists are historians who fabricate and/or misinterpret the evidence to suit their own ends.”

 

Donna watched him, eyes wide and a tiny awed smile on her face.

  
The first woman of the expedition looked askance, but kept up her smile. “Professor River Song, archaeologist,” she said, offering a handshake.

  
He frowned, ignoring the hand. “River Song, eh? Interesting name. I know I've heard it before.”

 

“I doubt that.”

 

The Doctor shook his head. “No, it's on the edge of my mind. Surely I'll remember where I've heard it before soon enough. But I do remember your face. We nearly ran into each other about a month ago according to my timeline, although I couldn't figure out what you were because you were masking yourself.”

 

Her sudden paling expression brought a tiny smile to his face, but he had no time to enjoy it. Instead he addressed the group. “As you're leaving, and you're leaving now, you need to set up a quarantine beacon. Code wall the planet, the whole planet. Nobody comes here, not ever again. Not one living thing, not here, not ever. Stop right there!” he cut himself off as he saw the older of the other two women coming too close to a shadow. “What's your name?”

 

“Anita,” the American answered.

  
“Anita, stay out of the shadows. Not a foot, not a finger in the shadows till you're safely back in your ship. Goes for all of you. Stay in the light. Find a nice, bright spot and just stand. If you understand me, look very, very scared.”

 

No one reacted much.

 

“I don't think they believe you, Doctor,” said Donna quietly. Then she added aloud, “I'm sure he means more scared than that.”

 

There was a slight change in the youngest woman's expression, who had responded to the first man's demands for contracts. River Song merely increased her smirk.

 

“Okay, that will do for now. You. Who are you?” he asked of one of the men.

  
“Er, Dave.”

  
“Okay, Dave. Then-”

  
The man interrupted, “Oh, well, Other Dave, because that's Proper Dave the pilot, he was the first Dave, so when we-”

  
The Doctor dragged him toward the way the six people had come. “Other Dave, the way you came, does it look the same as before?”  


“Yeah. Oh, it's a bit darker.”

  
“I'm not surprised. How much darker?”

  
“Oh, like I could see where we came through just like a moment ago. I can't now.”

  
“Seal up this door,” the Doctor commanded, walking back to Donna's side. He felt easier with her nearby. “We'll find another way out. Now-”

  
“We're not looking for a way out,” interrupted the first man sharply. “Miss Evangelista?”

  
Evangelista approached the Doctor and Donna timidly. “I'm Mister Lux's personal everything. You need to sign these contracts agreeing that your individual experience inside the library are the intellectual property of the Felman Lux Corporation.” She handed them each several papers.

  
The usage of paper in this age was a bit surprising, but the Doctor calmly replied, “Right, give it here.”  


“Yeah, lovely. Thanks,” said Donna at the same instant.

  
As one, the Doctor and Donna ripped up the contracts down the middle.

 

Lux spluttered, “My family built this library. I have rights.”

  
“You have a mouth that won't stop,” River said before turning to the Doctor. “You think there's danger here?”

  
“Something came to this library and killed everything in it. Killed a whole world. Danger? Could be. And that cavalier attitude is not sitting well with me. Especially in light of my seeing this sort of danger twice before. Everyone else died the first time, and only one other person survived last time.”

  
“That was a hundred years ago. The Library's been silent for a hundred years. Whatever came here's long dead,” River insisted.

  
“You're assuming I meant the Library, and I wasn't. I just told you that I witnessed nearly everyone else die twice before and you still bet your life?”

  
“Always,” she answered confidently, after a second's pause because of his correction.

 

“Well, I won't say 'I told you so' right before you die then.”

  
“What are you doing?” Lux demanded of Other Dave, stopping any reply River was ready to make.

  
Other Dave looked almost sheepish. “He said seal the door.”

  
“Thank you, Other Dave,” the Doctor said, pulling his torch back out and turning around the room to inspect it visually.

  
“You're taking orders from him?” Lux demanded.

  
“Spooky, isn't it?” The Doctor walked around the room, eying the recesses and carefully noting the shadows. He motioned for Donna to stay near him, and thought aloud. “Almost every species in the universe has an irrational fear of the dark. But they're wrong, because it's not irrational. It's Vashta Nerada.”

  
Donna, having heard the basics already, decided to focus on the one thing pushing the Doctor's buttons. “Spaceman, doesn't that mean the Vashta Nerada are in front of us as well as behind is? And isn't that woman the one we saw from a distance at Issus, Athens and Katta Flo Ko?” she whispered.

  
“Yes, I'm afraid it does mean we have danger coming from multiple directions. Yes, I fear she is. And yes, I want you to stay away from her. She feels like a demon come out of the dark. Lights!” he blurted out, getting animated. “That's what we need, lights. You lot have lights?”

  
“What for?” River asked.

  
He spared her a pointed look, his patented 'are you from the Planet of Idiots' look. “Form a circle. Safe area. Big as you can, lights pointing out.”

  
“Oi,” River said, shifting gears and slinging off her sack. “Do as he says.”

  
“You're not listening to this man?” Lux asked incredulously.

  
“Apparently I am,” she said, walking to a well-lit area and unzipping her bag. She sifted through it as she gave instructions. “Anita, unpack the lights. Other Dave, make sure the door's secure, then help Anita. Mister Lux, put your helmet back on, block the visor. Proper Dave, find an active terminal. I want you to access the library database. See what you can find about what happened here a hundred years ago. Big Dipper, you're with me. Step into my office.”

 

Donna's eyes went huge as soon as she heard the nickname. She looked at the Doctor, who acted as if oblivious.

  
Lux put his helmet on, but stopped short of putting down the visor. “Professor Song, why am I the only one wearing my helmet?”

  
“I don't fancy you.”

  
The Doctor shared a disgusted look with Donna, not surprised to see Lux take his helmet back off. He turned to Lux and almost smiled. “Don't look so angry, Mr. Lux. I can feel your relief from here. In your shoes, I would be feeling the same way. Okay, I can help you,” he said to Proper Dave, turning towards him.

  
“Big Dipper. With me, I said,” River said, a bit louder than before.

  
He started, face pinched. “Oh, I'm 'Big Dipper'?”

 

“Yes,” Donna said instantly, blushing deeply a second later. “Ooo, that came out a bit quick.”

  
His mood softened slightly, moving closer to find answers. “What does that name mean and why does it make you blush?”

  
Donna thought about her options, and found nothing to say that wasn't somehow incriminating. As in admitting she had _ever_ looked in that direction of his body. Or that she had ogled his bum – in front of her fiancé no less! – when he went up that ladder the day they met. But his innocence surprised her. Even if she couldn't meet his eyes. “You don't know?”

 

“No.”

 

If things weren't so dire, Donna might have hesitated more over answering. Especially since she was wondering what River meant by 'big', and worried about how she knew given the Doctor's suspicions about the woman.

 

As it was, her answer rushed out of her mouth in a whisper. “It's a reference to the size and length of a man's... appendage.”

 

Eight's eyes went bigger than Four's ever did, for a split second. He was still mostly ignorant of innuendos but when he did notice them aimed at him he was never happy. And given who said it, he was absolutely furious. Yet he held it in. “Don't let your shadows cross,” he called out to everyone. “I mean it, don't even let them touch. Any of them could be infected.”  


“How can a shadow be infected?” Other Dave asked.

 

“Set up the defences and then I'll explain,” the Doctor said, not moving an inch from Proper Dave's side.

 

“Oi! Big Dipper!”

 

“I didn't hear anything other than an order, and I don't take orders from stalkers,” Eight retorted. “Especially ones who make claims about me or use inappropriate names for me in public.”

 

That brought wide eyes to the whole room. River's were the most incredulous. “I need to speak with you.”

 

“Given that I'm positive you're the one I've sensed has been following me throughout several of my most recent adventures, you cannot possibly have anything to tell me that you can't say in front of the rest of this lot. And if you think you do, then I'm not going to listen to you until you stop acting with the worst of my people's smugness.”

 

River went silent, mouth slack.

  
Evangelista addressed Anita and Other Dave, who were no working together. “Excuse me, can I help?”

  
“No, we're fine,” said Anita.

  
The young woman's face contorted in obvious hurt. “I could just, you know, hold things,” she added weakly.

  
Other Dave was just as firm and blunt. “No, really, we're okay.”

 

Evangelista walked away sadly. Donna, with nothing else to do, walked right up to the pair, being careful about the shadows. “Couldn't she help?”

  
Other Dave shook his head and talked as if Donna was asking something stupid. “Trust me. I just spent four days on a ship with that woman. She's er...”

  
Anita finished the sentence. “Couldn't tell the difference between the escape pod and the bathroom. We had to go back for her. Twice.”

  
With nothing else to do, Evangelista joined her boss for a quiet conversation. Lux clearly had plenty to say. Meanwhile, Donna – disappointed in Anita and Other Dave – moved back toward the Doctor, slowly. Although her attention was half on the shadows and half on Professor Song.

 

By then, River had taken a battered book from her backpack. Its blue cover had eight squares on it, and the sight of it made the Doctor and Donna still. It looked frighteningly like the TARDIS. The Doctor had still not moved from beside Proper Dave, although the only help he got to give was to use the sonic to speed up the search.

  
With no other choice, River approached the Doctor carefully. “Thanks.”

  
“For what?” he asked, glaring at her in a silent warning against coming any closer.

  
It worked. River stopped a few feet away, clearly unnerved by his reaction. “The usual. For coming when I call. Even if it is far too soon in your timeline.”

  
“Oh, that was you? That explains a lot.”

  
“It was meant for a much later you.”

 

“And it _was_ originally going to go to a later me, but someone even later shifted it to me. And if a later me has allowed that nickname then I'm disgusted with them. And you for telling it to me here.”

 

That news made her pale and shake her head. “You're doing a very good job, acting like you don't believe me. I'm assuming there's a reason.”

  
He was convinced that it was not what she wanted to say, but she held back for whatever reason. “A fairly good one, actually. And although we did not meet the last time I'm suddenly certain that we have met before. Now why can't I recall the details?”

  
She looked at her book. “Okay, if it weren't so soon I would ask if we should do diaries, then. But I don't recall what I could talk about given which you I'm dealing with.”

 

“Then you've met earlier mes?” he interrogated, standing as tall as he could and letting the energy of the storm lift close to the surface.

 

“Doctor,” Donna cautioned. She kept to herself that standing tall wasn't going to work so well for him in this body.

 

He glanced at her and sighed after a few seconds. “Answer me,” he demanded of River.

 

“Blimey, very early days, then. Whoo, life with a time traveller. Never knew it could be such hard work. Spoilers, that's all I can say. But...Look at you. Oh, you're young,” she said, reaching out a hand to touch his face.

  
“Hands to yourself,” he snapped, stepping back. “I'm really not young, and if you know anything about me then you'd know I'm telling the truth.”

  
She recoiled in shock, hand held midair. “No, but you are. Your eyes. You're younger than I've ever seen you.”

  
He eyed her expression. “You're lying. You've seen me even younger.”

  
Before River could protest even weakly, a loud and familiar sound rang repeatedly.

 

Proper Dave winced. “Sorry, that was me. Trying to get through into the security protocols. I seem to have set something off. What is that? Is that an alarm?”

  
Donna shook her head. “No. Doctor? Doctor, that sounds like-”

 

“It is. It's a phone!” he cried in delight. “Someone's trying to contact us. Now, let's see what we can find out,” he said, taking over part of the controls and adjusting settings manually and with the sonic.

 

After several seconds working with the Doctor, Proper Dave announced, “I'm trying to call up the data core, but it's not responding. Just that noise.”

  
“But it's a phone,” Donna said.

  
“Let me try something,” said the Doctor.

 

Seconds later the screen changed its message to 'Access Denied'. The Doctor narrowed his eyes. “Okay, it doesn't like that. Let's try something else.” He worked at the controls for several seconds. “Okay, here it comes.”

  
Then the screen image changed. A girl of about ten was sitting on a couch, drawing paper in hand. She started at seeing them.

 

The Doctor smiled gently, hiding his surprise. “Hello?”

  
The girl sat taller. “Hello. Are you in my television?”

  
Intrigued by the answer, the Doctor shook his head. “Well, no, I'm, I'm sort of in space. Er, I was trying to call up the data core of a triple grid security processor.”

  
She plainly did not understand what he meant. But she remained calm and polite. “Would you like to speak to my Dad?”

  
“Dad or your Mum. That'd be lovely,” he agreed.

  
“I know you,” the girl suddenly said, eyes lighting up in recognition. “You're in my library.”

  
“ _Your_ library?”

  
“The library's never been on the television before,” the girl said, confused and nervous. “What have you done?”

  
“Oh, well, I just rerouted the interface.”

 

But the screen went back to before, saying 'Access Denied'.'

 

“What happened?” asked River. “Who was that?”

  
“I need another terminal,” the Doctor announced, moving away from Proper Dave to locate another terminal. “Keep working on those lights. We need those lights!”

  
“You heard him, people,” said River. “Let there be light.”

  
But the Doctor was eyeing where River's gaze was. The instant she turned away from him he rushed to the other terminal, where River had left her diary. In a flash he picked it up and slipped it inside the satchel, successfully dodging her attempt to grab it back.

  
“No, you're not allowed to see inside the book!” she cried. “It's against the rules.”

  
“What rules?” he asked, skeptically.

  
“Your rules!”

  
Suddenly, books started flying off the shelves. Everyone had to duck.

  
“What's that? I didn't do that. Did you do that?” the Doctor asked Proper Dave.

  
“Not me,” the man insisted.

  
The Doctor looked at the nearest screen, which said, 'CAL Access Denied'. “What's CAL?”

  
Instantly, the bombardment of books stopped. Donna took the opportunity to go over to Miss Evangelista. “You all right?”

  
The young woman was barely able to nod. “What's that? What's happening?”

  
“I don't know,” Lux said, even though no one was looking at him.

  
Donna focused on the young woman. “Oh, thanks, for er, you know, offering to help with the lights.”

  
Evangelista was near tears. “They don't want me. They think I'm stupid, because I'm pretty.”

  
That thinking was too close to what Donna had seen in some of the girls at school. “Course they don't. Nobody thinks that,” she insisted, not wanting to see someone else fall victim to that mental poison.

  
“No, they're right though. I'm a moron, me. My dad said I have the IQ of plankton, and I was pleased.”

  
Donna giggled. “See, that's funny.”

  
Evangelista shook her head. “No, no, I really was pleased. Is that funny?”

  
“No, no,” whispered Donna, all thoughts of amusement gone instantly.

  
The quiet murmuring amongst the group was silenced by more books shooting off their shelves.

  
River ducked more than one book as she called out, “What's causing that? Is it the little girl?”

  
“But who is the little girl? What does she have to do with this place? How does the data core work? What's the principle? And what's CAL?”

 

Strangely, the books stopped flying again.

  
“Ask Mister Lux,” River announced.

  
The Doctor turned to Lux, and stepped closer. “CAL, what is it?”

  
Lux was stubborn. “Sorry, you didn't sign your personal experience contracts.”

  
“Mister Lux,” the Doctor snapped. “Right now, you're in more danger than you've ever been in your whole life. And you're protecting a patent?”

 

Under the bluster there was a flicker of nervousness, and what looked to the Doctor like fear. “I'm protecting my family's pride.”

  
He laughed harshly, startling even Donna. “Well, I don't know about you, Mister Lux, but I don't want to see everyone in this room dead because some idiot thinks his pride is more important.”

  
“Then why don't you sign his contract?” River interrupted. “I didn't either. I'm getting worse than you.”

  
“Obviously that's easy for you to manage,” the Doctor retorted, disdain dripping like overflow water from a drain pipe. When she resumed her fish impression he addressed Lux again. “Okay, okay, okay. Let's start at the beginning. What happened here? On the actual day, a hundred years ago, what physically happened?”

  
“There was a message from the Library,” River said after a few seconds. “Just one. 'The lights are going out'. Then the computer sealed the planet, and there was nothing for a hundred years.”

  
“It's taken three generations of my family just to decode the seals and get back in,” Lux admitted.

  
“Er, excuse me?” said Evangelista.

  
“Not just now,” Lux dismissed her.

  
River carried on, almost as if there had been no interruption. “There was one other thing in the last message.”

  
“That's confidential,” Lux reminded her.

  
“I trust this man with my life, with everything.”

  
“You've only just met him,” he protested.

  
“No, he's only just met me.”

  
Evangelista spoke up again, a little less timid. “Er, this might be important, actually.”

  
“In a moment,” Lux snapped.

  
River drew out a data screen. “This is a data extract that came with the message,” she said, showing the Doctor.

  
He did not take it, but read it in an instant. “'Four thousand and twenty two saved. No survivors'.”

  
“Four thousand and twenty two. That's the exact number of people who were in the library when the planet was sealed.”

  
Donna was baffled by River's words. “But how can four thousand and twenty two people have been saved if there were no survivors?”

  
“That's what we're here to find out,” River said.

  
“And so far, what we haven't found are any bodies,” Lux said.

 

“Given the threat we're dealing with, what you're looking for are skeletons,” the Doctor muttered aloud.

 

Suddenly there was a loud scream.


	6. Shadows and Darkness

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The danger builds. And the Doctor's distrust of a certain person increases.

_From Chapter Five:_

 

_Donna was baffled by River's words. “But how can four thousand and twenty two people have been saved if there were no survivors?”_

_  
“That's what we're here to find out,” River said._

_  
“And so far, what we haven't found are any bodies,” Lux said._

 

“ _Given the threat we're dealing with, what you're looking for are skeletons,” the Doctor muttered aloud._

 

_Suddenly there was a loud scream._

 

The Doctor followed it into the neighboring lecture hall. “This door wasn't open before,” he noted as he began to investigate.

 

Almost immediately they saw a skeleton in rags that looked like they had once been white. “Everybody be careful. Stay in the light,” he announced.

  
“You keep saying that,” Proper Dave protested. “I don't see the point.”

  
'Who screamed?” the Doctor demanded, ignoring the Human man.

  
“Miss Evangelista.”

  
“Well, where is she?” The Doctor's voice was questioning and harsh, but his eyes were fixed on the skeleton.

  
River pressed a button on the comm. unit at her neck. “Miss Evangelista, please state your current-” She cut herselff off as she realized her voice was echoing from nearby. Eyes growing wide, she repeated, “Please state your current position.”

  
A lit comm. unit was on the remains of the skeleton's collar. River drew it away from the skeleton and swallowed. “It's her. It's Miss Evangelista,” she whispered.

  
“We heard her scream a few seconds ago,” Anita breathed. “What could do that to a person in a few seconds?”

 

“It took a lot less than a few seconds.”

  
“What did?”

  
“Hello?” came Miss Evangelista's voice from the comm. unit.

  
River closed her eyes, unknowingly drawing a bit of surprise from the Doctor. “Er, I'm sorry, everyone. Er, this isn't going to be pleasant. She's ghosting.”

  
Donna was not following. “She's what?”

  
“Hello?” continued the late woman's frightened voice. “Excuse me. I'm sorry. Hello? Excuse me.”

  
“That's, that's her, that's Miss Evangelista,” Donna breathed.

  
Proper Dave's face was pained. “I don't want to sound horrible, but couldn't we just, you know?”

  
“This is her last moment,” River snapped, quietly. “No, we can't. A little respect, thank you.”

  
Evangelista continued, clearly unaware of what had happened to her. “Sorry, where am I? Excuse me?”

 

“But that's Miss Evangelista,” Donna repeated.

  
“It's a data ghost,” River explained. :She'll be gone in a moment. Miss Evangelista, you're fine. Just relax. We'll be with you presently,” she added, calm and reassuring.

  
The change in River's demeanor barely registered to Donna. She turned her head slightly to address the Doctor. “What's a data ghost?”

  
“There's a neural relay in the communicator,” he quietly explained. “It lets you send thought mail. That's it there. Those green lights. Sometimes it can hold an impression of a living consciousness for a short time after death. Like an afterimage.”

  
“My grandfather lasted a day,” said Anita, her voice breaking slightly. “Kept talking about his shoelaces.”

  
“She's in there,” Donna insisted.

  
“I can't see. I can't. Where am I?” Evangelista's voice asked.

  
“She's just brain waves now,” said Proper Dave, trying to explain while not triggering another retort from River. Even if his thoughts towards Miss Evangelista had not been as cruel as the others'. “The pattern won't hold for long.”

  
“But, she's conscious,” Donna said, only hearing the pain in the voice. “She's thinking.”

  
“I can't see. I can't. I don't know what I'm thinking.”

  
The Doctor placed a hand on Donna's shoulder. “She's a footprint on the beach. And the tide's coming in,” he said, mournfully.

  
“Where's that woman? The nice woman. Is she there?”

  
Lux frowned. “What woman?”

  
Donna sucked in a silent breath. “She means... I think she means me.”

  
“Is she there? The nice woman,” Evangelista continued.

  
“Yes, she's here. Hang on.” River turned to address Donna softly. “Go ahead. She can hear you.”

  
“Hello? Are you there?”

  
Donna was silent.

 

The Doctor leaned in to whisper, “Help her.”

  
“She's dead,” Donna answered, just as quietly.

  
“Yes. Help her. Ease her passing.”

  
“Hello? Is that the nice woman?” Evangelista's voice asked again.

  
Donna found her voice. “Yeah. Hello. Yeah, I'm, I'm, I'm here. You okay?”

  
“What I said before, about being stupid. Don't tell the others, they'll only laugh.”

  
“Course I won't. Course I won't tell them.” Donna couldn't think of anything else to say.

  
“Don't tell the others, they'll only laugh,” the voice repeated.

  
Donna frowned. “I won't tell them. I said I won't.”

  
“Don't tell the others, they'll only laugh.”

  
“I'm not going to tell them,” Donna insisted.

  
The green light started blinking as the voice repeated, “Don't tell the others, they'll only laugh.”

  
“She's looping now,” River explained. “The pattern's degrading.”

  
“I can't think,” Evangelisa's voice called out plaintively. “I don't know, I, I, I, Ice cream. Ice cream. Ice cream. Ice cream. Ice cream.”

  
“Does anybody mind if I?” River did not finish the sentence.

  
“Ice cream. Ice cream.”

  
When no one objected, River turned off the comm. unit.

  
Donna was crying, reaching to grasp the Doctor's hand on her shoulder for comfort. “That was, that was horrible. That was the most horrible thing I've ever seen.”

  
“No. It's just a freak of technology,” River insisted, her tone going dark. “But whatever did this to her, whatever killed her, I'd like a word with that.”

  
“I'll introduce you,” the Doctor said. He did not trust himself to not make a remark on her change of attitude.

 

Once back in the Rotunda they had been in since meeting, the Doctor announced, “I'm going to need a packed lunch.”

  
“Hang on,” River said, opening her bag again. “Will you return my book?”

  
“What's in that book?” he asked, ignoring the question.

  
“Spoilers. I would think you of all people would understand.”

 

“And from what I sense, you seem to play fast and loose with spoilers, only honouring them when it suits you. Who are you?”

  
She bit her lip, holding back some comment. “Professor River Song, University of-”

  
“To me. Who do you think you are to me?”

  
“Again, spoilers,” she insisted. “Chicken and a bit of salad. Knock yourself out. I expect my book back.”

 

“Only when you tell me the truth. Now, you lot. Time for you to meet the Vashta Nerada,” he said, drawing his torch back out and beginning scans, starting with the floor.

  
With nothing else to do, River approached Donna. “You travel with him, don't you? The Doctor, you travel with him.”

  
Donna felt wary of her for her own reasons. She reminded her of women she had seen who went after a man without caring what his own wishes were. Even after what happened with Lance she still had some empathy for them, but this professor was in a league of her own. That lack of trust in the Doctor's warnings was the most troubling part. “What of it?”

  
The Doctor's voice stopped their talk. “Proper Dave, could you move over a bit?”

  
“Why?” asked the man.

  
“For fewer shadows to scan. Over there by the water cooler. Thank you.”

  
While Proper Dave followed instructions, Donna turned her attention back to River. “I remember seeing you from a distance. You were there, in the background more than once. The Doctor's already got one being messing with his life. If he thinks you're trouble, I tend to believe him. So you think you know him, do you?”

  
River laughed, aiming for light and not quite making it. “Oh God, do I know that man. We go way back, that man and me. Just not this far back. Nowhere near this far back.”

  
Donna let her skepticism drip. “I'm sorry, what?”

  
“He hasn't met me yet,” River explained, after a few seconds of hesitation. “I sent him a message, but it went wrong. It arrived _far_ too early. This is the Doctor in the days before he knew me. And he looks at me, he looks right through me and it shouldn't kill me, but it does.”

  
“What are you talking about? Are you just talking rubbish? Do you know him or don't you? Because he clearly doesn't know or trust you.”

  
“Donna, I'm concentrating,” interrupted the Doctor, sharper than his usual tone yet nothing like the argument they had had before coming.

  
“Sorry,” she said, just loud enough that he could hear. And she knew it was quieter than Humans would believe.

  
River's eyes widened as they fixed on Donna's face. Or more accurately, her eyes. “Donna. You're Donna. Donna Noble.”

  
“Yeah. Why?” she replied, after a few seconds silence.

  
The tone said to not mess with her, and from River's expression she knew it. If anything, her expression became resigned, mournful as her eyes teared. “I do know the Doctor, but in the future. His personal future.”

  
“And yet another one of him bounced your signal. To a him who doesn't trust you at all and has no reason to. And why don't you know me? Where am I in the future?”

 

As much as the Doctor wanted answers to that, he had to interrupt. “Okay, found a live one. That's not darkness down those tunnels,” he said, pointing toward a shadow under a chair that was rather dark. “This is not a shadow. It's a swarm. A man-eating swarm.”

 

Donna, nervous about River, drew closer – still being careful about the shadows – while the Doctor drew a chicken leg out of the lunch box River had provided. Between the time he threw it and the time it hit the floor the meat had vanished completely.

 

In the silence that followed, the Doctor began the explanation he had hoped to avoid. “The piranhas of the air. The Vashta Nerada. Literally, the shadows that melt the flesh. Most planets have them, but usually in small clusters. I've never seen an infestation on this scale, or this aggressive.”

  
If not for his earlier talk, Donna would have had questions about where, but instead it was River who asked, “What do you mean, most planets? Not Earth?”  
  


He noted the affection she had for the planet, and added it to his long list of questions about her. “Yes, Earth, and a billion other worlds. Where there's meat, there's Vashta Nerada. You can see them sometimes, if you look. The dust in sunbeams.”  
  


River looked around at some of the dust in the air, and her voice had lost all of her confidence. “If they were on Earth, we'd know.”  
  


“No. Normally they live on road kill. But sometimes people go missing. Not everyone comes back out of the dark.”  
  


“Every shadow?” River clarified.  
  


“No. But any shadow.”  
  


“So what do we do?” River asked, quietly.  
  


The Doctor thought a second. “With Daleks, you aim for the eyestalk. Sontarans, back of the neck. Vashta Nerada? Run. Just run. And now do you believe me when I told you all to leave immediately?” he snapped at River, sparing her a sharp glance.  
  


River ignored the sharpness. She had no choice if she wanted to continue her beliefs. “Run? Run where?”  
  


“This is an index point,” the Doctor mused aloud. “There must be an exit teleport somewhere.”  
  


Lux started when most of the group looked his way. “Don't look at me, I haven't memorised the schematics.”  
  


Donna's eyes lit up. “Doctor, the little shop. They always make you go through the little shop on the way out so they can sell you stuff.”  
  


He grinned at her. “You're right. Brilliant, Donna! That's why I like the little shop.”  
  


“Okay, let's move it,” Proper Dave said, preventing Donna from retorting about the Doctor's shopping habits or lack thereof. He took a step towards the shop.  
  


“Actually, Proper Dave?” called out the Doctor, suddenly very calm vocally but his eyes were anything but. “Could you stay where you are for a moment?”  
  


Proper Dave stopped and stared at him. “Why?”  
  


The Doctor's eyes were mournful. “I'm sorry. I am so, very sorry. But you have two shadows.”  
  


They all looked, and he did, at right angles to each other. There was no light source that could account for the second one.  
  


“It's how they hunt. They latch on to a food source and keep it fresh. I've seen it before.”  
  


“What do I do?” whimpered the man.  
  


“You stay absolutely still, like there's a wasp in the room. Like there's a million wasps,” he amended.  
  


“We're not leaving you, Dave,” River added.  
  


“Of course we're not leaving him,” the Doctor said, not willing to look away to give River a look that said what he thought of the idea. “Where's your helmet? Don't point, just tell me.”  
  


“On the floor, by my bag,” he answered.  
  


Anita retrieved it and carefully brought it over to the Doctor.

  
“Don't cross his shadow,” the Doctor reminded her. She succeeded. “Thanks. Now, the rest of you, helmets back on and sealed up. We'll need everything we've got,” he said as he put Proper Dave's helmet on him.  
  


Donna looked around and her eyes went huge in horror. “But, Doctor, we haven't got any helmets.”  
  


“Yeah, painfully aware of that, Donna. I'm going to find a way to get us out safely.”

  
“In the meantime, how are we safe?!” she cried.  
  


“Well, we're not right now. I wasn't about to tell you a clever lie to shut you up. I respect you too much to attempt that. Professor, anything I can do with the suit?”  
  


“What good are the damn suits?” Lux snapped. “Miss Evangelista was wearing her suit. There was nothing left.”  
  


River was thinking and had an idea. “We can increase the mesh density. Dial it up four hundred percent. Make it a tougher meal.”  
  


“Okay, that's worth a try.” The Doctor immediately used his screwdriver to adjust Proper Dave's suit. “Eight hundred percent. Pass it on.”  
  


But River was holding something up with a grin. “Gotcha.”

  
The design reminded the Doctor of what he had seen two of his later incarnations using. But he did not believe his eyes for an instant. “What's that?”  
  


“It's a screwdriver.”  
  


He realized then and there that he hated when people used an 'that's obvious' tone with him. “It's sonic.”  
  


“Yeah, I know. Snap,” River said before she went to upgrade everyone else's spacesuit. And her own.

That was enough for the Doctor. He grabbed Donna's hand. “With me. Come on.”

 

He rushed her into the shop they had seen a glimpse of through one of the doorways.

 

“What are we doing?” Donna demanded when they entered. “Are we shopping?! It's hardly a good time to shop!”

  
The Doctor dragged her to a lectern by a small dais with three roundels in it. “No talking, Donna, just moving. Try it. Right, stand there in the middle. It's a teleport. Stand in the middle. Can't send the others because the Old Girl won't recognise them.”

  
“What are you doing?” she snapped, refusing to move.

  
“You don't have a suit. You're not safe.”

  
“You don't have a suit, so you're in just as much danger as I am and I'm not leaving you.”

  
He grabbed her arms. “Donna, let me explain. I don't trust her to not have some trap set for you. I need you safely away, and if you're in the TARDIS then you can help with scans and even perhaps move her to pick me up. You know enough that I think you can do it.”

  
Donna thought about it. “That's it?”

 

“Doctor,” called River.

 

“Okay,” Donna consented, stepping onto the spot.

 

The Doctor pressed several buttons, and then Donna teleported away. “Oh, that's how you do it,” he muttered before hurrying back into the rotunda.

  
When he arrived, the Doctor immediately saw why River called him. “Where did the second shadow go?”

  
“It's just gone,” Proper Dave said. “I looked round, one shadow, see.”

  
“Does that mean we can leave?” River asked. “I don't want to hang around here.”

  
Lux was impatient and nervous. “I don't know why we're still here. We can leave him, can't we? I mean, no offence.”

  
“Shut up, Mister Lux,” River snapped.

  
“Did you feel anything, like an energy transfer? Anything at all?” the Doctor asked Proper Dave.

  
“No, no, but look, it's gone,” Proper Dave said as he turned around to look.

  
“Stop there,” the Doctor commanded. “Stop, stop, stop there. Stop moving. They're never just gone and they never give up.” He used the sonic to scan the shadow they could see. “Well, this one's benign.”

  
“Hey, who turned out the lights?” Proper Dave blurted out.

  
The Doctor stood. “No one, they're fine.”

  
“No seriously, turn them back on,” Proper Dave demanded, terror in his voice.

  
“They are on,” said River, confused.

 

“I can't see a ruddy thing.”

  
“Dave, turn around,” the Doctor requested.

  
Proper Dave did, and it provided no comfort to anyone, least of all the Doctor. His visor was completely dark. “What's going on? Why can't I see? Is the power gone? Are we safe here?”

  
The Doctor had a sinking feeling about this. While he had not quite seen this himself, it was too close to what happened at the space station where the Nashta Verada were experimented on. “Dave, I want you stay still. Absolutely still.”

  
Proper Dave jerked into stillness.

  
“Dave? Dave? Dave, can you hear me? Are you all right? Talk to me, Dave,” the Doctor asked.

  
“I'm fine. I'm okay. I'm fine.”

  
“I want you to stay still. Absolutely still.”

  
“I'm fine. I'm okay. I'm fine. I can't. Why can't I? I, I can't. Why can't I? I, I can't. Why can't I? I-”

  
They all watched as Proper Dave's comm. unit lights blinked.

  
“He's gone,” River said softly. “He's ghosting.”

  
“Then why is he still standing?” asked Lux.

  
“Hey, who turned out the lights?” they heard from Proper Dave, just as before. “Hey, who turned out the lights?”

  
“Oh, no,” the Doctor muttered. “Dave, can you hear me?”

  
“Hey, who turned out the lights?”

  
“Does everyone else have their things?” the Doctor asked. Only River didn't have her helmet on, but hers was on the other side of Proper Dave. “Yeah?” he added when he saw the nodding. “Then stay back from it!”

 

Suddenly the visor changed, and a skull appeared in his helmet. “Hey, who turned out the lights? Hey, who turned out the lights?” he continued, lurching a step towards them.

  
River stepped backwards. “Doesn't move very fast, does it?”

  
“It's a swarm in a suit. But it's learning,” the Doctor added, glancing around for an escape route. Which became even more important when the now Skeletal Dave produced four shadows, and all of them were growing.

  
Lux was now in a panic. “What do we do? Where do we go?”

  
River grabbed something from the holster on her hip. “See that wall behind you? Duck.”

 

All of them did. River help up a gun and fired it at the wall, making a square hole in it.

  
“A squareness gun?!” the Doctor squawked.

  
“Everybody out,” River commanded. “Go, go, go. Move it. Move, move. Move it. Move, move,” she added as they rushed out into the hall.

 

They appeared amongst a shelf-line corridor, each shelf filled with books. River turned to the Doctor. “You said not every shadow.”

  
“But any shadow.”

  
“Hey, who turned out the lights?” they heard, coming closer.

  
“Run!” the Doctor and River cried at the same instant, for once on the same page.

 

After several minutes they paused by a series of massive shelves of books. The Doctor acted to sonic a light fitting. “Trying to boost the power. Light doesn't stop them, but it slows them down.”

  
River added her sonic, which boosted the light. “So, what's the plan? Do we have a plan?”

  
“Where did you get your screwdriver?” He demanded.

  
She shrugged. “You gave it to me.”

  
“I don't give a screwdriver to anyone.”

  
She smiled. “I'm not anyone.”

  
“So you think. Who are you?”

  
“What's the plan?” River asked.

 

“You're not learning it until you cease presuming you're important to me.”

 

“Where's Donna?”

 

That he was willing to answer. “I teleported Donna back to the Tardis. Should be able to contact her now so she can help,” he added, drawing out the sonic. But when he checked the readings he paled. “She's not there. I should have received a signal. The console signals me if there's a teleport breach.”

  
“Well, maybe the coordinates have slipped,” River suggested. “The equipment here's ancient.”

 

“Or did you tamper with them?!” he accused.

 

River recoiled. “I would never cause harm to the most important woman in the universe!” she snapped. “It'd be very bad if something happened to her here.”

  
A little taken aback by her words, the Doctor rushed to a nearby Node. “Donna Noble. There's a Donna Noble somewhere in this library. Do you have the software to locate her position?”

  
The node turned its head. As it spoke, it had Donna's face and voice. “Donna Noble has left the library. Donna Noble has been saved.”

  
“No,” whispered the Doctor, feeling his universe fall out from under him.

  
“Donna Noble has left the library,” the Node continued in Donna's matter-of-fact tone. “Donna Noble has been saved.”

  
“How can it be Donna?” River breathed. “How's that possible?”

  
“Donna Noble has left the library. Donna Noble has been saved,” the Node repeated, not reacting as the Doctor's fingers numbly stroked her face.

  
“No, no, no!” the Doctor wailed.

  
“Donna Noble has left the library.”

  
“Hey, who turned out the lights?” they heard from a distance.

  
“Doctor!” River cried.

  
The Doctor did not hear any of the repeating words. He only thought about how he had failed his best friend, who stirred so many confusing feeling within him. He started when River grabbed his arm and dragged him along, calling out for the others to follow. Before long, they ran into a dead end. From one end came more shadows. From the other lumbered the skeletal remains of Proper Dave in his swarm-filled suit.

  
“Doctor, what are we going to do?” River asked.

  
“Hey, who turned out the lights?” Dave's neural relay said.

  
At the same time, they heard, “Donna Noble has left the library. Donna Noble has been saved.”

 

But the Doctor remained silent, numbed to his surroundings and trapped within his own mind.


	7. The Building Dangers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things get tenser at the Tyler flat. And things look like they're only going to get worse for Eight.

_From Chapter Four:_

 

“ _What?” Jackie said, muting the TV. “You recognise that creature?”_

 

“ _Another alien. You mentioned the 'daddy', Mickey? Well, you just saw one of them.”_

 

“ _What are they?” Mickey asked before anyone else could._

 

“ _Sycorax. A warrior species from the outer reaches of the Sol System. If they're here then they mean to conquer the Earth. And we're down some key defences.”_

 

_He would not admit his fears then. Earth was screwed._

 

 

_Powell Estate_

_December 25, 2005_

 

Mickey promptly hurried to sit down at a table and keep at finding information. He had plenty of motivation after hearing Eight's warning. Not that he knew that he should be calling him that.

 

Rose and Jackie remained silent, ignoring the telly to not look at the images running constantly on the screen. They looked at Eight in horror.

 

“So... what can we do?” asked Jackie. “Can you use the TARDIS at all?”

 

Eight took a deep breath. “I have some access, but with the Doctor so ill the TARDIS is also feeling it. So whatever made him that ill is why we and the planet are in enormous trouble. Rose, know anything about what caused it?”

 

He was playing with fire, but he hoped to make her realize that whatever she did was wrong. If she was merely a stroppy teenager then he would make the attempt to get through to her. As little as he wanted to.

 

Rose cringed. “You're blaming me?!”

 

“You're the only one here who knows what caused the Doctor's regeneration. It might help me help him. You don't want him to remain like this, do you?”

 

Luckily for her, Mickey spoke. “Rose, Dr. Smith. Take a look. I've got access to the military.”

 

Eight accepted the interrupting, since it was information he needed. He walked to look over Mickey's shoulder. He could mostly ignore Rose following, although he noted that she kept to the other side of Mickey.

 

“They're tracking a spaceship,” Mickey continued. “It's big, it's fast, and it's coming this way.”  


“Coming for what, though? The Doctor?” she asked.

  
“I don't know. Maybe it's coming for all of us.” As he spoke, Mickey obtained a clear image of four of the aliens. “You called them the what?”

 

“Sycorax,” Eight repeated.

 

“How dangerous are they?”

 

“They like to claim worlds. Clearly they saw the probe or the Doctor's energy. Perhaps they detected the numerous telly and radio signals this planet gives off.”

 

“So what kind of danger?” Rose asked, finally looking at Eight.

 

“Enslaving the planet.”

 

That rendered Rose silent. She stepped away and sat down.

 

Jackie sighed and walked to Rose's room. “Someone needs to stay with him, and I don't want to keep watching that.”

 

“Thank you, Jackie. Keep track of what they're doing, Mickey,” Eight ordered. “If they do anything or any new information comes, get my attention. I'll think of something we can do.”

 

But suddenly they heard a harsh language coming from the aliens. Whatever was happening on UNIT's end, Eight did not detect any attempts at a translation there.

 

Rose straightened at the sound at what seemed like weird Klingon to her. “I don't understand what they're saying. The TARDIS translates alien languages inside my head, all the time, wherever I am.”

  
Mickey frowned. “So, why isn't it doing it now?”

  
“Because the Doctor is part of the circuit,” Eight explained. “The TARDIS doesn't work correctly if he's ill.” He wasn't about to admit that he understood every word, and that none of it was good news.

 

“So he's... he's broken,” Rose suggested.

 

“Ill. And from how you're reacting, I'd say you feel some guilt. Why?”

 

On the TV, they heard one of the news readers saying, “Despite claims of an alien hoax, it's been reported that NATO forces are on red alert.”

  
“Oh, come on, sweetheart,” they heard Jackie saying in the other room. “What do you need? What is it you need? Tell me.”

  
“Speaking strictly off the record, government sources are calling this our longest night,” said another reporter on location through the TV.

 

/=/=/=/=/=/

 

There was a sort of standoff between Rose and Eight for hours. She would not talk with him and he refused to let her come closer than the doorway of her room while Eleven lay almost motionless.

 

Jackie had fallen asleep by Eleven's bedside, and not been disturbed by Eight and Mickey discussing what the latter was finding on the computer.

  
At length, Rose finally sniffled. “The Doctor wouldn't do this. The old Doctor, the proper Doctor, he'd wake up. He'd save us.”

 

“Did you not hear what I said has happened to him?” Eight interrupted her. “He's suffering from regeneration sickness. It takes all sorts of forms, from amnesia to a coma. You're going to blame him for something that isn't his fault?”

 

Rose stiffened and glared at him. “And who are you to judge me?”

 

“Someone who's seen the symptoms before. Someone who can take care of him. Which is more than you have done. You've given up on him. Not exactly a friend, are you?”

  
“I'm not his friend!” Rose snapped, ignoring that it woke her mother. “I'm the woman he loves!”

 

Eight cringed, his face scrunching in disgust. “'Loves'? You think you love him, do you?”

 

“I know I do!”

 

While he could not pretend to be an expert on the subject, he knew enough to know he had her on one level there. “You're a teenager. You've hardly lived. How can you know how an alien loves? How can you be willing to commit yourself to someone more than old enough to sire many generations of your family? Where there's a great age difference there needs to be a common maturity level and common goals. Are you really willing to sacrifice yourself at an instant's notice because his duty to Time demands it? Is that really what you want?”

 

Mickey watched and listened to the screen, which was showing the latest attempts to communicate with the Sycorax. But his attention was being drawn away from the computer and to the train wreck he saw behind him. “Jackie, do you want me to get popcorn?”

 

“He's been a foster father, and a grandfather,” Eight carried on, barely letting Mickey finish and not letting either of the Tylers respond. “Some of them were your age. Now, why would you be different? Especially when you've given up on him? He has to know that you're that kind of person. He's not so easily fooled.”

 

Unless it was by a Time Demon that could meddle with his mind, his ship's directions, and his timeline. But he would not say that aloud.

  
Rose turned to Mickey and Jackie. “Are you two going to let him speak to me like that?”

 

“You deserved those words,” Jackie interrupted. “Every one of them.”

 

“Mum! You married young!”

 

“Don't you 'Mum' me! Your dad was much closer to my age when we married. This is hardly the same thing. I've seen friends who married much older men, and that limited their lives in so many ways. You hitch your future to a man who's so set in his ways that you have to accept them if you want to keep him. I don't want that for you. You could've had someone like Mickey, but after this you've ruined your chances with him. You've got used to getting what you want by playing 'victim' far too long. Well, I won't stand for it anymore!”

 

Rose's eyes watered. She looked at Mickey, who had a poker face and remained silent. He plainly thought it was about time that Jackie put her foot down.

 

Eight frowned suddenly. “Why were you offering to get popcorn, Mickey?”

 

“Oh, it's a saying. That whatever is happening is as good as a movie and you need popcorn to enjoy it with. A popcorn moment, we call it.” His glare at Rose said that Jackie was right, that he wouldn't take Rose back even if she begged him now.

 

The phrase confused Eight. Never mind unintentionally giving him bad flashbacks.

 

Suddenly outside the flat they heard a woman calling out, “What is wrong with you? Jason? Jason?!”

  
Puzzled, Eight rushed outside. Rose and Mickey followed him.

 

Rose recognized the woman. “Sandra?”

  
Sandra looked at them in desperation. “He won't listen. He's just walking. He won't stop walking! There's this sort of light thing. Jason? Stop it right now! Please, Jason, just stop.”

  
Eight, Rose and Mickey looked down and saw dozens of people walking through the estate.

 

“Where are they going?” asked Rose.

 

“So, a light appeared over them first,” Eight mused. His eyes widened. “Oh, dear.”

 

“What?” asked Mickey. “What does it mean?”

 

“At a guess, blood control that acts specifically on the consciousness and reasoning centres.”

 

“How's that possible?”

 

“If the probe had a sample of Human DNA then anyone with that blood type is vulnerable to this sort of control,” Eight explained. “The Sycorax are attempting to hold part of the population ransom to make the people of Earth do their bidding.”

 

“But where are those people going?” Rose re-asked.

 

Within minutes, it was obvious. They were all on the rooftops, inches away from jumping off.

 

Mickey paled. “What do we do?”

  
“Nothing,” Rose whispered. “There's no one to save us. Not anymore.”

 

“You have me,” Eight said firmly. “And it's time to use what we do have.”

 

They rushed inside the Tyler flat to find Jackie watching the telly. The Prime Minister, Harriet Jones, sat in a panelled room. Union flags were on either side, and a picture of Her Majesty was on the desk. Eight was the only one in the room who knew the lighting was fake, as there were no windows in the press/announcement offices to avoid snipers getting a chance shot in.

 

The woman looked completely tense as she spoke. “Ladies and gentlemen, if I may take a moment during this terrible time. It's hardly the Queen's speech. I'm afraid that's likely to be cancelled.” She paused to speak to an aide who stood off camera. “Did we ask about the royal family?”

 

The answer was not audible, but her expression said it all. “Oh. They're on the roof,” she said, just loud enough to be heard.

 

“Oh, this is not good,” muttered the Doctor.

 

Harriet tried for composure. “But, ladies and gentlemen, this crisis is unique. And I'm afraid to say, it might get much worse. I would ask you all to remain calm. But I have one request. Doctor, if you're out there, we need you. I don't know what to do. If you can hear me, Doctor. If anyone knows the Doctor, if anyone can find him, the situation has never been more desperate. Help us. Please, Doctor. Help us. God help us.”

  
Rose burst into tears. “What are we going to do?” she asked Eight. “The Doctor isn't able to help. You tell me he hasn't gone and left me. But thats' what it feels like to me, Doctor Smith. He's left us all.”

  
Jackie grabbed her into a hug, giving Eight a plea to not interfere. “It's all right. I'm sorry.”

  
Suddenly, all the glass in the windows shattered. Even some of the glass items inside the flat broke.

 

“What the hell?!” Mickey cried.

  
Eight led the others to look out the windows. They and everyone not possessed watched as a huge rock moved deliberately through the atmosphere. It came to a stop practically overhead, and covered _a lot_ of the sky.

 

“That has to be almost as big as London,” Mickey said.

 

Eight made a quick decision. “Mickey, help me carry the Doctor to the TARDIS. Rose and Jackie, get some food for yourselves.”

  
“Do you think it'll help?” Mickey asked.

  
“The TARDIS is the only safe place on Earth. Especially for him.”

  
“What're we going to do in there?” Jackie asked.

  
“Hide?” Rose suggested.

  
Jackie gave her a sharp look. “Is that it?”

  
“Mum, look in the sky. There's a great, big, alien invasion and I don't know what to do, all right? I've travelled with him, and I've seen all that stuff, but when I'm stuck at home, I'm useless. Now, all we can do is run and hide, and I'm sorry.”

 

“You're only useless if you think of yourself as such,” Eight retorted. “You Humans should remember that before telling a disabled relative that. Now, come on, Mickey.”

 

It took a few minutes more than he liked, but Eight led them out. He and Mickey carried the Doctor down the stairs while Jackie and Rose each struggled with four carrier bags a-piece. When they reached the TARDIS Eight fumbled to get his key out without having to let go of Eleven.

 

“Here,” said Rose, getting to her own key first. “Mum, will you just leave the rest of that stuff and give us a hand?” she added as she unlocked the TARDIS.

  
“It's food! He said we need food,” Jackie protested as Rose held the doors open.

  
“And you may,” Eight said as he led them inside. As little as he liked Rose having a key he couldn't afford to argue it at present; it would mean having to tell her who he really was. Instead he rushed them inside. “Close the doors!” he called out once they were all inside.

 

Mickey sighed as they lay him on the grating, on the softest spot. “No chance you could fly this thing?” he asked Rose.

  
“Not anymore, no.”

 

The answer stunned Eight into silence.

  
Mickey frowned. “Well, you did it before.”

  
Rose shrugged. “I know, but it's sort of been wiped out of my head, like it's forbidden. Try that again and I think the Universe rips in half.”

  
“Ah, better not, then,” Mickey said.

  
“Do you mean to tell me that you're the one who tore the TARDIS panel open?!” Eight shouted.

 

Rose started, but stood up. “Well, there was this message that kept following me around. I saw him command it to open to regress a Slitheen into an egg. I figured it could also help me get back to him and save him.”

 

“Do you even know what you did?! He has his own people who could help him, who he could call on! That kind of power is not meant to be held even by a Time Lord! The TARDIS has safety measures to protect herself. And how the hell did it not kill you instantly?!”

 

If he had questioned it before, he was certain now that this girl was somehow connected to the Moment. If the energy, which he had to assume that Ten had drawn out of Rose in a way he did not want to know yet, had forced a regeneration on him, then there was no chance it wouldn't have killed a Human who forced it from the TARDIS. Had the TARDIS willingly shared her power then a Human could survive because the Old Girl would shield them from the full force of the Vortex energy. But it was obvious that it had not been shared willingly.

 

“I... I don't know,” Rose cried, tearing in the face of his anger.

  
Mickey decided he had to interrupt. “Okay, so us helping Rose was a bad idea. Doesn't tell me what we do now. Just sit here?”

  
“While I figure out what I can do,” Eight said. “Most of the TARDIS' functions depend on the Doctor being completely well. If nothing else convinces you that your actions were wrong, it's this denial of a key protector to the Earth. Maybe _I_ can call on help from the Time Lords,” he added, turning to work the controls to the best of his ability. There was a chance the Old Girl would fight him on this, and he hoped she would. Else he might have to fake it to maintain his cover.

  
“Right, here we go. Nice cup of tea,” Jackie interjected, offering cups to Mickey and Rose. She then poured from a flask she brought.

  
Rose took a sip to distract herself. “Mmm, the solution to everything.”

  
“Now, stop your moaning. I'll get more food, we might need it.”

 

“It's not safe to go out,” Eight said, grunting as the ship vented steam at him. At least the Old Girl had some fight in her yet, and was helping him keep his cover.  


But Jackie had already closed the doors behind her.

 

Eight groaned. “Humans,” he muttered, just barely loud enough to count as a whisper rather than a breath. He had to struggle to find controls that the TARDIS was willing to let him touch long enough to get the information he needed. But he was certain that intergalactic hyperlink communication was inoperable, which made contacting Gallifrey next to impossible. Not without contacting them in his time and exposing that he had left without their knowledge; that would put Ohila's life in danger.

  
Mickey let out a harsh laugh. “Tea. Like we're having a picnic while the world comes to an end. Very British. How does this thing work? If it picks up TV, maybe we could see what's going on out there. Maybe we've surrendered. What do you do to it?”

  
“I don't know,” Rose said. “It sort of tunes itself.”

 

“Let's see what I _can_ pull up,” Eight said, switching his focus to the scanner. “It seems to be working to an extent.”

 

Rose kept away as Mickey joined Eight. “How can you trust him, Mickey?”

 

“Because he clearly knows what he's doing,” Mickey answered. “And he's actually treating me with respect, thank you.”

 

Eight frowned at a new reading. “That's odd.”

  
“Maybe it's a distress signal?” asked Mickey.

  
“A fat lot of good that's going to do,” Rose muttered.

  
Mickey fixed a hard look on her. “Are you going to be a misery all the time?”  


“Yes.”

 

“Don't take that entitled tone with me,” Eight said. “It makes you look like a child.”

  
Rose squawked in protest, but Mickey spoke first. “You should look at it from my point of view, stuck in here with your mum's cooking.”

 

“It smelled fine to me,” Eight said, taking another reading.

  
“Where is she?” Rose said, changing the subject as she put down her cup on a flat surface. “I'd better give her a hand. It might start raining missiles out there.”

  
“Tell her anything from a tin, that's fine,” said Mickey.

  
“Why don't you tell her yourself?” Rose asked as she went to the doors.

  
“I'm not that brave.”

 

As Mickey spoke, Eight suddenly realized what the readings were telling him.

  
“Oh, I don't know,” Rose said as she opened the doors and stepped outside. She was almost immediately grabbed by a Sycorax. She screamed.

  
“Rose?” Mickey cried, dropping the open flask of tea near where the man he knew as the Doctor lay.

 

“Get off! Get off me!”

  
Rose's screams led Eight and Mickey to run out. “Close the doors behind you,” Eight commanded.

  
They got there just before a Sycorax. As Mickey closed the doors they heard the Sycorax cheer.

  
Harriet got Rose freed and hugged her. “Rose. Rose! I've got you. My Lord. Oh, my precious thing. The Doctor, is he with you?”

  
Rose shook her head. “No. We're on our own.”  
  
The man with Harriet, a device in his hands, spoke. “The yellow girl. She has the clever blue box. Therefore, she speaks for your planet.”  
  
Harriet was horrified. “But she can't.”

  
Rose took a deep breath. “Yeah, I can.”

  
“Don't you dare,” Mickey protested, eyes huge.

  
“Someone's got to be the Doctor,” she insisted.

 

“No,” Eight said, firm and sharp.

  
“They'll kill you,” Harriet added, thinking this other man was helping her make her case.

  
“Never stopped him,” Rose pointed out, her voice calmer than her eyes suggested she was.

 

“Because you who put the Doctor into that state has no right to speak for Earth,” Eight clarified. “But I do, as its long-standing protector.” He turned to face the Sycorax leader, eying where the whip was aimed at. “You have heard the name 'The Doctor'. He has stood before many invaders of this planet and seen them off. If you also know the stories, you know of his species. I am one of them, a Time Lord, and that box is our technology.”

 

Rose gasped, ignoring the stilled silence from the Sycorax. “But you said-”

 

“That was an alias for Earth. Now shut up and let an adult do the talking. You'll get more people killed otherwise. Now, Sycorax Leader, I am a Time Lord of the planet Gallifrey, the highest ranking life recognised by the Shadow Proclamation. See this Seal in my hand?”

 

He held up the Seal of Rassilon made for him by Romana. The sight created an even bigger silence from his audience, who seemed to sense the power he was concealing. And producing it alerted him to something hidden off to the side, which gave him more fodder for his upcoming speech.

 

“If you do not leave this planet immediately and release all of the inhabitants, under the Convention 12 of the Shadow Proclamation, with regards to pre-spacefaring civilisations Statues 1-6; Convention 13 of the Shadow Proclamation, with regards to enforced or coerced infiltration and harvesting and/or capturing of indigenous and sentient life-forms for the use as livestock, weapons, soldiers, or biological and medical use hereof Statues 6, 17, and 34; and Convention 15, with regard to peaceful contact – which you have failed to adhere to – all of which you, the Sycorax, have signed to avoid dealing with the Judoon. Instead, you have forced a greater authority to turn up in their place. Never mind Convention 18 with regards to seizing the property of life-formed ranked higher than yourself, for that folded object you have displayed on that shelf is property of my homeworld. I shall call upon the powers of Gallifrey to send you all off. As this planet's defender I will stop you from harming anyone else. It's up to you whether any of your people have to suffer, and I know there are non-combatants on this rock you call a ship. It will be on your head if they are hurt by your refusal to be sensible.”

 

He prayed they would buy it. His ability to call would depend on Romana and Ohila. The former was still ignorant of his leaving Gallifrey, and the other might be in danger if he had to make that call. Else he was left with a very bad option.

  
The Sycorax were all silent, thinking about his words. They looked to their leader, who was the most still of all. Eight could feel the anger and tension in his frame. Then he burst into laughter, provoking the others to also do so.

  
Harriet's aide continued to translate. “You speak with authority, but no power can stop us. Not even the alleged powers of a race lost in a great war. And now you're going to die.”

 

“Why do you all have to say that?” Eight asked, suspecting that the leader refused to be defeated by someone smaller than him. He was racking his brain for something he could use to halt the danger as the leader walked up to him. He could only think of challenging the leader, and given that the leader was as big as the Draconian of the Draconians – not to mention a lot stronger – Eight did not like his odds.

  
The leader spoke as the aide carried on translating. “You were clever to stop that wailing child from using stolen words. But we are the Sycorax, we stride the darkness. If you are the best this planet can offer as a champion-”

  
“Then your world will be gutted.”

 

Except the words came from both the Sycorax leader and from the translator.

  
“And your people enslaved,” the leader continued.

  
“Hold on, that's English,” said the translator.

  
“Yes, it is,” Eight confirmed, standing taller and more confident as a smile cracked his face. “Now you all can hear him without needing that translation equipment.”

  
“I would never dirty my tongue with this planet's primitive bile,” the leader insisted.

  
“But that's English. Can you hear English?” Rose asked Mickey.

  
He nodded. “Yeah, that's English.”

  
“Definitely English,” confirmed the translator.

  
“I speak only Sycoraxic!” shouted the leader.

 

“If you Humans can hear English, then it's being translated,” Eight said, his grin growing wider as a huge amount of tension left his body. “Which means the TARDIS translation circuits are working. Which means..."


	8. A Remembered Prophecy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A Doctor at his emotional limits is never safe to be pushed further. Someone learns this too late.

**Chapter Eight: A Remembered Prophecy**

 

_From Chapter Six:_

 

“ _Doctor, what are we going to do?” River asked._

_  
“Hey, who turned out the lights?” Dave's neural relay said._

_  
At the same time, they heard, “Donna Noble has left the library. Donna Noble has been saved. ”_

 

_But the Doctor remained silent, numbed to his surroundings and trapped within his own mind._

 

 

_The Library_

_51st Century_

 

River finally had enough and fired her squareness gun at a wall as Skeletal Proper Dave continued his last words. Once the gun did its job she yelled, “This way, quickly. Move!”

  
They rushed through as they heard, once again, “Hey, who turned out the lights?”

 

The Doctor recovered enough awareness to shout, “Reform the wall!”

 

River paused in her rushing. “What?”

 

“You mean you've only used it for destroying things?!”

 

She looked at the weapon, fiddling with the controls. And started when the Doctor grabbed it out of her hands.

 

“Here,” he said, modifying it and reforming the wall. “Proves you're not as smart as you think, if you don't now what it can do. Now, move!”

 

They hurried into another large room after the Doctor had to use it again – both to cut a square in the wall with River's gun and to reform it.

 

River looked around at the light mostly from the large moon hanging high in the orange sky. “Okay, we've got a clear spot. In, in, in! Right in the centre. In the middle of the light, quickly. Don't let your shadows cross. Doctor-”

  
“Leave me to my scans,” he snapped, stuffing the gun into his satchel.

  
“That's also mine!”

 

“Given your predilection for items that are not to be used lightly, I'm keeping it,” he stated as he scanned. “Never mind that I can tell that it spent time in the TARDIS in my future. It also has a signature not consistent with you, which means you pinched it from my TARDIS without bothering to learn all its features.”

 

She clenched her fists but made no further protest or even an attempt at denial. Although her mental face-palming was evident for all to see. “There's no lights here. Sunset's coming. We can't stay long. Have you found a live one?”

  
“Maybe. It's getting harder to tell. What is wrong with you?” he snapped at his sonic, tapping it with his hand.

  
“We're going to need a chicken leg,” River planned aloud. “Who's got a chicken leg? Thanks, Dave,” she added as Other Dave drew out his lunch box and offered one. She threw the meat into the shadow the Doctor was scanning, and once again it became just bone before it hit the ground.

  
The room was silent, and River took a step back. “Okay. Okay, we've got a hot one. Watch your feet.”

  
The Doctor shook his head. “They won't attack until there's enough of them. But they've got our scent now. They're coming.”

  
River motioned the others back away from the shadows, trying to regain her composure. So she was not ready when Other Dave asked a question clearly on all three of their minds.

 

“Oh, yeah, who is he? You haven't even told us. You just expect us to trust him?”

  
“He's the Doctor,” she simply said, keeping quiet.

  
“And who is the Doctor?” Lux demanded.

  
“The only story you'll ever tell, if you survive him.”

 

“How very flattering,” the Doctor said, proving that he could hear every word despite the lowered voices. “And completely ignoring the times when many do survive.”

  
Anita spoke next to River. “You say he's your friend, but he doesn't even know who you are.”

  
River paused a few seconds to find the right words, and it took much longer than she liked. “Listen, all you need to know is this. I'd trust that man to the end of the universe. And actually, we've been.”

  
“He doesn't act like he trusts you,” Anita continued. “If anything, he knows enough to think you're not to be trusted.”

  
“Yeah, there's a tiny problem,” River admitted reluctantly. “He hasn't met me yet.”

 

The Doctor's head popped up, looking into the shadows but not quite seeing them. Something in her hesitation was pushing against what felt like a door in his mind, and something behind it was trying to push its way out. He put an effort at opening the door, but felt like something was holding it closed. Something he knew he did not cause.

  
He heard her walk over to where he knelt, and he stood to keep a little distance between them.

  
“What's wrong with it?” she asked.

  
It was obvious she meant the sonic, and he decided to be honest. There was no reason not to be about it. “There's a signal coming from somewhere, interfering with it.”  


She frowned. “Then use the red settings.”

  
He returned the frown, although deeper. “It doesn't have any red settings.”

  
“Well, use the dampers.”

  
“It doesn't have dampers,” he snapped, in his 'how stupid are you' tone that he only used when someone said something that seemed utterly silly.

  
River showed her sonic. “It will do one day.”

  
Once again, the Doctor startled River by taking an object right from her. He looked at the design that looked like a version of what he saw his Tenth and Eleventh selves using. He turned a dark look on her. “So, some time in the future, I just give you some version of my screwdriver.”

  
“Yeah,” she said, going for a smile but failing in the face of his palpable distrust.

  
“And why would I do that?”

  
A scowl finally crossed her face, like she thought he was being unreasonable. “I didn't pluck it from your cold dead hands, if that's what you're worried about.”

  
“And why should I believe you given that by your own admission you're always lying?”

  
River recoiled, but pressed her case. “Listen to me. You've lost your friend. You're angry. I understand.”

 

“How can you?!”

 

The force made all four of the others blanch and lean back. River nearly stepped back from the weight of his fury.

 

“Do you even appreciate what Donna did for me? I lost another friend a long time ago, along with a family member. Did you know that?”

 

River opened her mouth as she thought. “Um... no.”

 

“Ah! So, for all those times you say we spent together I never trusted you with that bit? That is proof that you cannot know my pain right now! Donna was very like my other lost friend, and she came into my life when I needed someone to help me remember joy and delight. No slight on Lucie, but Donna was the very best friend I've ever known. She never demanded anything of me that I couldn't do or give, and never asked me to break the laws of time. She also had the strength of character to stand up to me when she felt I wasn't respecting her views or when I was missing something important!”

 

“But you need to be less emotional, Doctor, right now,” River interjected.

 

Her words made him shake. “Less emotional? I'm not emotional. I'm facing my own death now!”

  
River knew enough to be worried. From her wild expression, she had never seen him like this. “There are five people in this room still alive. Focus on that. Dear God, you're hard work young!”

  
Something in her words and eyes made him still. Even as whatever was behind that door in his mind was slamming hard, desperate to get out. “Young? Who are you?!”

  
“Oh, for heaven's sake!” Lux shouted. “Look at the pair of you. We're all going to die right here, and you're just squabbling like an old married couple.”

 

“ _Married_?!”

 

When a Time Lord shouted, it could cause glass to vibrate enough to shatter and even rattle items out of place. The Doctor's shout actually made River step back.

 

“How _dare_ you give that association between us,” the Doctor snapped, his voice lowering from a shout to a loud speaking voice. “A creature who fits everything bad about my people? Who deceives at an instant's notice? Who is masking her true nature from my scanners ? Who makes the smuggest Time Lord I've ever met look humble? Who doesn't respect the rules about spoilers enough to _not_ attempt to compare notes? Who treated a women she claimed is the most important in the universe dismissively? I would _never_ marry someone like River Smug. And if I were to marry a Human, the last one I could consider, the one who meant the most to me, just died because this _creature_ summoned us here!”

  
River swallowed hard. She could see only one way to make him see. “Doctor, one day I'm going to be someone that you trust completely, but I can't wait for you to find that out. So I'm going to prove it to you. And I'm sorry. I'm really very sorry.”

  
As she moved closer, the door within the Doctor's mind suddenly burst open. His eyes went wide and he held up a hand. “Don't come any closer!”

 

“But I need to give you proof!”

 

“Proof that you can only whisper in my ear?! I can only think of one thing that you could possibly need to whisper in my ear, and there is no chance I would ever _willingly_ tell you that secret. More likely you found some way to force my hand.”

 

“But, Doctor, I need us to be good! We're a fixed point, you and me!” River cried, rushing forward.

  
But the Doctor's hand whipped into the satchel and drew out the squareness gun.

 

River stopped as she saw him aim it right at her head. “Doctor, you're not that sort.”

 

“Not what sort? I'll tell you what sort of man I am. I'm the sort who does not take being tricked into things lightly. My own people have done it to me for long enough, and another creature with horrible temporal smells tried the same years ago. She burned me, changed me into a sort of warrior with a holy mission to stop her for good. Your actions make me wonder if somehow she's influenced you, or made it easier for you to wipe my memory of my previous encounters with you.”

 

She gasped. “But... you weren't supposed to remember. I learned that you had no memory of me prior to your Eleventh face. That's why I did it.”

 

“Time Lord minds aren't easily suppressed. If anything, our three brain stems and multiple chambers were an evolutionary measure to prevent such meddling. Only a Time Demon capable of meddling with my mind and timeline could make it possible, and I just broke through the mind lock. You've been following me through my lives, and wiped my memory of meeting you each time. Why should I trust you if you didn't trust me enough to modify my memories with each regeneration? Or when I had a prophecy about a creature who ought not to exist the way she does trying to force a false fixed point on me? Oh, the rest of you can relax a bit. I'm no danger to you. Only to her.”

 

River started shaking, and her eyes only looked away enough to see if any shadows were near her. “Doctor, please. You do trust me!”

  
“I trust my sonic screwdriver,” he said, putting hers away and getting his back out, all with one hand as he kept the gun aimed at her. It said something about how little he trusted her that he kept her own gun aimed at her the whole time. “And do you know what's interesting about my screwdriver? Very hard to interfere with. Practically nothing's strong enough. Well, there are some hairdryers, but I'm working on that. And I detect that there is a very strong signal coming from somewhere, and it wasn't there before. So what's new? What's changed? Come on! What's new? What's different?”

  
Other Dave was the first to find the voice to speak. “I don't know. Nothing. It's getting dark?”

  
The Doctor narrowed his eyes. “It's a screwdriver. It works in the dark.” His eyes glanced at the slowly moving moon. “Moon rise. Tell me about the moon. What's there?”

  
Lux was quick with a nervous answer. “It's not real. It was built as part of the Library. It's just a Doctor Moon.”  


“And what's a Doctor Moon?”

  
“A virus checker. It supports and maintains the main computer at the core of the planet.”

  
The Doctor checked the readings without letting River out of his sights. “Well, still active. It's signalling. Look. Someone somewhere in this library is alive and communicating with the moon. Or, possibly alive and drying their hair. No, the signal is definitely coming from the moon. I'm blocking it, but it's trying to break through.”

  
Suddenly an image of Donna appeared. She was not wearing the same clothes as before, but her eyes fixed on him in shock.

  
The Doctor gasped. “Donna! Donna, where are you?!”

  
But her ghostly image disappeared.

 

“No, no, no!” the Doctor shouted. He had to lower the weapon enough to use both hands to adjust the scan.

  
River did not dare step closer, but she instantly clung to the hope sprung within her. “That was her. That was your friend! Can you get her back? What was that?”

  
“Hold on, hold on, hold on,” he commanded. “I'm trying to find the wavelength. Oh, come on! I'm being blocked.”

  
“Professor?” Anita suddenly said, her voice filled with tension.

  
“Just a moment,” River said.

  
“It's important. I have two shadows.”

 

That got the Doctor's attention as well. “Oh, no,” he breathed.

  
River swallowed. “Okay. Helmets on, everyone. Anita, I'll get yours.”

  
“It didn't do Proper Dave any good,” Anita whimpered.

  
“Just keep it together, okay?” River said, picking up the helmet as the others out theirs back on.

  
Anita let out a dark laugh. “Keeping it together. I'm only crying. I'm about to die. It's not an overreaction,” she said as River put the helmet on her.

  
“Hang on,” the Doctor said, stepping forward and sonicked the visor black.

  
“Oh God, they've got inside,” River cried.

  
“No, no, no. I just tinted her visor. Maybe they'll think they're already in there and leave her alone.”

  
“Do you think they can be fooled like that?” she asked, incredulous.

  
He shrugged. “It's a swarm. It's not like we chat. But it's better than doing nothing.”

  
“Can you still see in there?” Other Dave asked Anita.

  
“Just about,” she said, managing to hang on to a shred of composure.

  
“Everyone, just, just, just stay back from Anita. And prepare to move. I can hear Proper Dave's relay, so grab your things. Professor, a quick word, please.”

  
River looked hopeful as she came closer. “What?”

  
“Remember my warning. I have your gun, and if you're lucky I'll use it if you come any closer, Professor Snog.”

 

“My same is-”

 

“I know what you say your name is, but I've heard stories about you and hallucinagenic lipstick. Not that I knew it was you at the time. I say it's even odds whether your proper last name is Smug or Snog. If I had been going to choose a Human as a wife, Donna would've been her. Because she would never tell me something that would leave me no choice but to marry her later on. That alone is enough reason to not trust you. You just attempted to entrap me into marriage, and the Time Lords are the only people who might take a dimmer view of it than I do.”

 

River's eyes watered. “Sweetie, please. Just let me-”

 

“Professor, one more 'sweetie' or attempt to whisper in my ear, and you will be lucky if I don't push you into one of those hot shadows over there. I told you that I sensed you following me and Donna, and I have enough stalkers already.”

  
“Hey, who turned out the lights?”

  
At the sound of Proper Dave's voice, the Doctor shouted, “Run!”

  
“Hey, who turned out the lights?” followed them as they left the room. Although the gun never left the Doctor's hand.

 

But during the group's run through a high level walkway to another library skyscraper, the Doctor stopped suddenly. He had an idea and had to use it. “Professor, go on ahead. Find a safe spot.”  


River could not believe his actions, even with all her memories. “It's a carnivorous swarm in a suit. You can't reason with it.”

  
“I have to try.”

 

“Then let me have my sonic back so I can scan for danger!”

 

He grimaced but quickly located it in his satchel and tossed it to her. “Fine, fine, fine! Now, move!”

  
“Other Dave, stay with him,” she commanded. “Pull him out when he's too stupid to live. Two minutes, Doctor.”

 

With that she led Anita and Lux out.

 

“Follow them,” the Doctor commanded.

 

“You need backup,” Other Dave insisted.

  
Proper Dave's swarm-filled suit barged through the doors. “Hey, who turned out the lights?”

 

“You have a better chance of living if you follow them,” the Doctor quickly said before beginning his plan, and making sure he was standing firmly in a well-lit area. His choice was easy, so he addressed the swarm as he tucked the gun into his satchel. “You hear that? Those words? That is the very last thought of the man who wore that suit before you climbed inside and stripped his flesh. That's a man's soul trapped inside a neural relay, going round and round forever. Now, if you don't have the decency to let him go, how about this? Use him. Talk to me. It's easy. Neural relay. Just point and think. Use him, talk to me.”

  
“Hey, who turned out the lights?” Proper Dave's relay said, still moving forward.

  
“The Vashta Nerada live on all the worlds in this system, but you hunt in forests. What are you doing in a library?” the Doctor demanded.

  
“We should go. Doctor!” cried Other Dave.

 

“One minute,” the Doctor insisted. “You came to the library to hunt. Why? Just tell me why?”

  
Suddenly Proper Dave's suit stopped. “We did not.”

  
The Doctor stilled. It was Proper Dave's voice, but the tone was not. “Oh, hello.”

  
“We did not,” the voice repeated.

  
“Take it easy and you'll get the hang of it. You did not what?”

  
“We did not come here.”

  
“Oh, of course you did. Of course you came here.”

  
“We come from here,” said the voice.

  
“From here? How?” the Doctor asked.

  
“We hatched here.”

  
The Doctor shook his head. “But you hatch from trees. From spores in trees.”

  
“These _are_ our forests,” the voice insisted.

  
“You are nowhere near a forest. Look around you.”

  
“These _are_ our forests.”

 

“But you're not in a forest, you're in a library. There are no trees in a library.”

 

But as he spoke the penny dropped.

  
“We should go. Doctor!” repeated Other Dave.

  
“Books. You came in the books. Of course! Micro-spores in a million, million books,” the Doctor thought aloud.

  
“We should go. Doctor!”

  
“Oh, of course! The forests of the Vashta Nerada, pulped and printed and bound. A million, million books, hatching shadows.”

  
“We should go. Doctor!”

  
The Doctor turned, and his hearts sank as he saw that Other Dave was now also a skeleton. “Oh, Dave! Oh, Dave, why didn't you listen?”

  
“Hey, who turned out the lights?” said Proper Dave's relay again.

  
“We should go. Doctor!” cried the neural relay of Other Dave.

  
As shadows extended from both of them, the Doctor grabbed his sonic. “You know I'm constantly accused of being stupid. People say I talk too much and always babble on. But do you want to know the only reason I'm still alive? I always stay near the door.”  


The Doctor opened a trapdoor with his sonic screwdriver and dropped out of sight. And out of reach of the shadows. He had to grab part of the building structure, having stuck his sonic between his teeth, and climb.

 

And stay in the light. Not an easy ask.


	9. Dueling and Other Fighting Methods

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eight and Eleven (Ten in canon) finally get to properly interact. Shame there's alien invaders to deal with.

_From Chapter Seven:_

 

“ _But that's English. Can you hear English?” Rose asked Mickey._

_  
He nodded. “Yeah, that's English.”_

_  
“Definitely English,” confirmed the translator._

_  
“I speak only Sycoraxic!” shouted the leader._

 

“ _If you Humans can hear English, then it's being translated,” Eight said, his grin growing wider as a huge amount of tension left his body. “Which means the TARDIS translation circuits are working. Which means...”_

 

 

_The Sky Above London_

_December 25, 2005_

 

He led the Humans in turning to look at the Tardis. The doors opened, and the Eleventh Doctor stood in his borrowed clothes, grinning.

  
“Did you miss me?” he said, carefree.

 

“About time!” Eight snapped. “I thought I was going to have to be Earth's champion!”

 

The Sycorax leader cracked his whip. Except Eight was ready. He caught the end and yanked it out of the leader's hand.

  
“You could have someone's eye out with that,” Eleven said, a little pompously as he stepped out and closed the doors firmly behind him.

  
“How dare you!” shouted the leader.

  
Another Sycorax went after Eleven, with a thick pole. But he was also ready and merely took it off that one and broke it across his knee. “You just can't get the staff. Have you noticed that?” he asked Eight.

 

“Many times,” he agreed.

 

“Now, you, just wait,” Eleven addressed the Sycorax. “I'm busy. Mickey, hello! And Harriet Jones, MP for Flydale North. Blimey, it's like This Is Your Life. Tea! That's all I needed, a good cup of tea! Super-heated infusion of free radicals and tannin. Just the thing for healing the synapses.”

 

Eight face-palmed himself. “Of course! Why didn't I think of that?!”

 

“It had to happen this way, I'm afraid,” Eleven explained, as if telling him to not be so hard on himself. “Now, first thing's first. Be honest, how do I look?” he asked the Humans.

  
Rose was the first to speak. “Er, different.”

  
“Good different or bad different?”

  
She shrugged. “Just different.”

  
“Am I ginger?”

 

Eight groaned under his breath. “Now I suddenly understand why some of my companions thought I looked silly asking that.”

  
Rose glanced at Eight in confusion before looking back at Eleven. “No, you're just sort of brown.”

  
Eleven frowned. “I wanted to be ginger. I've never been ginger. And you, Rose Tyler, fat lot of good you were.” He pointed at her accusingly. “You gave up on me. Oh, that's rude. Is that the sort of man I am now, am I? Rude. Rude and not ginger.”

 

“I'm sorry. Who is this?” Harriet asked.

  
“I'm the Doctor,” he said. “And so is he.”

  
“But what happened to my Doctor? Or is it a title that's just passed on?” Harriet demanded, not believing her eyes or ears.

  
“I'm him. I'm literally him. Same man, new face. Well, new everything.”

 

“Did you have to go there?” Eight muttered, only earning a cheeky grin from Eleven. Of all the innuendos he had to pick up on, and he had learned quite a few after an entire evening at the Tyler flat, it was that one. Lovely. And, as the cherry on top, Eleven had nearly told them who he was. His only hope was that Rose might be too shocked from Eleven calling her out on her behavior to have noticed.

 

“But you can't be,” Harriet said.

  
Eleven stepped closer to the Prime Minister. “Harriet Jones, we were trapped in Downing Street and the one thing that scared you wasn't the aliens, it wasn't the war, it was the thought of your mother being on her own.”

  
Given the sudden light in her eyes, she believed him now. “Oh, my God.”

  
He grinned. “Did you win the election?”

  
She nodded with a smile. “Landslide majority.”

  
“If I might interrupt,” said the Sycorax leader, clearly having had enough of waiting.

  
Eleven turned and stepped beside Eight as he spoke. “Yes, sorry. Hello, big fellow. Don't mind my friend if he recovers our people's property.”

 

Eight took the opportunity. The shock of the Sycorax, combined with the continued exchanges, allowed him to walk unchallenged to the pillar.

  
“Who exactly are you?”

  
“Well, that's the question,” Eleven began.

  
“I demand to know who you are!” demanded the leader.

  
“I don't know!” Eleven snapped, mocking the leader's gruffness. “See, there's the thing. I'm the Doctor, but beyond that, I just don't know. I literally do not know who I am. It's all untested.”

 

As Eleven spoke, Eight examined the object by sight after picking it up. As he walked back to his previous spot by Eleven, his time senses told him that the object was from the temporal past, and had psychic qualities. Was this the psychic paper he had heard about? How did the Sycorax got hold of one? Hadn't he heard of a CIA agent who went missing?

 

“You remember what that's like. The questions we ask after each time,” Eleven said to Eight, who nodded absently. Not that the former cared as he continued regardless. “Am I funny? Am I sarcastic? Sexy?”

 

Eight noted the look that came into Rose's eyes, and he fixed a glare on her. Sadly for him, she was focused on Eleven and missed it.

 

Eleven continued as if ignorant of what transpired. “Right old misery? Life and soul? Right handed? Left handed? A gambler? A fighter? A coward? A traitor? A liar? A nervous wreck? I mean, judging by the evidence, I've certainly got a gob. And how am I going to react when I see this; a great big threatening button. A great big threatening button which must not be pressed under any circumstances, am I right? Let me guess. It's some sort of control matrix, hmm? Hold on, what's feeding it?”

  
Having stepped next to the pillar in question, he opened the base under the button. “And what've we got here? Blood?” He dipped his finger into the liquid and tasted the sample, making just only the Humans' eyes widen. “Yeah, definitely blood. Human blood. A Positive, with just a dash of iron. Ah, but that means blood control. Blood control! Oh, I haven't seen blood control in years. Isn't that right?” he asked Eight.

 

Eight nodded as he tucked the paper into a back pocket. “At least hundreds of years ago.”

 

“You're controlling all the A Positives,” Eleven continued, speaking once again to the Sycorax. “Which leaves us with a great big stinking problem. Because I really don't know who I am. I don't know when to stop. So if I see a great big threatening button which should never be pressed, then I just want to do this.”

 

He hit the button.

  
Rose and Harriet screamed simultaneously, “No!”

 

“Wait for it,” said Eight, calm as you please since he knew where Eleven was going with this.

 

“You killed them!” cried the translator.

  
“What do you think, big fellow?” asked Eleven. “Are they dead?”

  
The Sycorax leader was silent for a few seconds. “We allow them to live.”

  
Eleven and Eight both laughed. Given the likeness of the speed, they might have both been thinking of the same event from an overly stuffy Senate meeting.

 

“Allow?” Eight managed through his laughter, surprised by how much he enjoyed the looks on the Humans' faces. “You have no choice.”

 

“Indeed, that's all blood control is,” Eleven added. “A cheap bit of voodoo. Scares the pants off you, but that's as far as it goes. It's like hypnosis. You can hypnotise someone to walk like a chicken or sing like Elvis. You can't hypnotise them to death. Survival instinct's too strong.”

  
“Blood control was just one form of conquest. I can summon the armada and take this world by force,” said the leader.

  
“Well, yeah, you could, yeah, you could do that, of course you could. But why?” Eleven raised his hands to gesture at the Humans. “Look at these people. These human beings. Consider their potential. From the day they arrive on the planet and blinking step into the sun, there is more to see than can ever be seen. More to do than. No, hold on. Sorry, that's The Lion King.”

 

Eight covered his eyes. Was this what he would become? From one ill-mannered person to another?

 

“But the point still stands. Leave them alone!” Eleven commanded.

  
“Or what?” the leader goaded.

  
“Or...” Eleven took a sword from an aide and ran back towards the TARDIS, stopping between the Old Girl and the Sycorax. “I challenge you.”

  
All the Sycorax laughed. Eight stifled a groan.

 

“Oh, that struck a chord. Am I right that the sanctified rules of combat still apply?” Eleven asked no one in particular.

  
The leader stepped closer. “You stand as this world's champion.”

  
“Thank you. I've no idea who I am, but you just summed me up,” Eleven said, removing his dressing gown and tossing it to Eight. “You keep the others from interfering,” he told him. “So, you accept my challenge? Or are you just a cranak pel casacree salvak?”

 

Eight winced. “Was that wise?” He was glad that the TARDIS would not translate swearing, because that one would incite a war in even the most peaceful species.

 

The leader tossed his own cape aside as his people hissed in shock and horror. “For the planet?”

  
“For the planet,” the Doctor agreed right before they clashed swords.

 

The sounds clanged through the room. Soon the Doctor was being driven back towards a wall.

  
“Look out!” Rose cried.

  
“Oh, yeah, that helps,” Eleven said, focusing hard on the conflict but entirely aware of his surroundings. “Wouldn't have thought of that otherwise, thanks.”

 

Eight was sure Rose failed her fellow teenagers in not reacting to the sarcasm. But he was more focused on staying between the Humans and the fighting duo. And his own nerves jangled when it quickly became obvious that the Sycorax leader was the more experienced swordsman. It was made clear when Eleven had to retreat up a tunnel.

  
“Bit of fresh air?” Eleven said, keeping the carefree manner as he slapped a door control.

 

Eight led the others to follow them out into the day light. They watched in horror as Eleven was driven to the edge of the ship, and hit on the nose.

  
“Stay back!” Eight said, stopping Rose from going forward. “Interfere in the fight and you invalidate the challenge and they win the planet.”

  
But even he stopped breathing when the leader knocked Eleven down and then slashed his wrist. The sword and Eleven's right hand fell to Earth.

  
Eleven stilled in shock. “You cut my hand off.”

  
“Ya! Sycorax!” the leader cried in triumph, walking away as if the victor.

  
But Eleven slowly rose to standing. “And now I know what sort of man I am. I'm lucky. Because quite by chance I'm still within the first fifteen hours of my regeneration cycle, which means I've got just enough residual cellular energy to do this.”

  
Within seconds, a new hand grew from his right wrist.

  
“Witchcraft,” the leader accused.

  
“Time Lord,” he corrected. “Didn't my fellow correct you?”

  
“Catch!” Eight called out, snagging another sword and throwing it to Eleven.

 

“Win the planet, Doctor!” cried Rose.

  
“Oh, so, I'm still the Doctor, then?” he said, a hint of sarcasm in his tone.

  
“No arguments from me!” she called back.

  
Eleven's gaze turned harsh, clearly aware of Eight's thoughts about how it seemed like being hit on by a ten-year-old. He channeled it against the leader. “Want to know the best bit? This new hand? It's a fighting hand!”

  
Eight's lips pursed at the brief switch in accent from English to American, but remained silent as the fighting resumed. It lasted several seconds before Eleven gained an advantage. He pressed it immediately, disarming the Sycorax leader and thumping both hilts into his abdomen, twice. The leader fell, right on the edge, overlooking London.

  
“I win,” Eleven said, calmly.

  
The mortification from the Sycorax leader was palpable. “Then kill me.”

  
Eight knew his future self would not do that. And he was not disappointed in the command that followed.

 

“I'll spare your life if you'll take this Champion's command. Leave this planet, and never return. What do you say?”

  
The leader hesitated for a few seconds. “Yes.”

  
“Swear on the blood of your species,” Eleven commanded.

  
“I swear,” he answered immediately.

  
Eleven poked the swords into the dirt, like garden spades. “There we are, then. Thanks for that. Cheers, big fellow.”

  
“Bravo!” Harriet cried.

  
Rose nodded. “That says it all. Bravo!”

  
Eight met Eleven halfway and helped him put the dressing gown on as Eleven spoke. “Ah, not bad for a man in his jim-jams. Very Arthur Dent, don't you agree?”

 

“Yes, it has that flair,” Eight nodded. “Now, there was a nice man. Very much underestimated. Even if he did forget his towel.”

 

Eleven frowned as he walked. “Hold on, what have I got in here?” He plunged a hand into a pocket and dragged out a small orange orb. “A satsuma. Ah, that friend of your mother's. He does like his snacks doesn't he? But doesn't that just sum up Christmas?”

 

As he spoke, the Sycorax leader, furious at losing to such a skinny creature, got up and grabbed his sword.

 

“You go through all those presents and right at the end, tucked away at the bottom, there's always one stupid old satsuma. Who wants a satsuma?” Eleven asked rhetorically.

  
The Sycorax leader ran at the Doctor's back. Mickey saw and opened his mouth, but Eleven, with no outward sign that he had noticed, threw the satsuma at a control on the spaceship hull, right on another door control. A piece of the wing folded up and the leader fell to his death, shouting in dismay the whole way down.

  
Eleven's face turned stony. “No second chances. I'm that sort of a man.”

 

“Please remember that,” Eight said, quietly, as they walked back inside the spaceship.

 

Once inside, Eleven addressed the remaining Sycorax, who were all rendered silent by watching the result of the fight. “By the ancient rites of combat, I forbid you to scavenge here for the rest of time. And when go you back to the stars and tell others of this planet, when you tell them of it's riches, it's people, it's potential. When you talk of the Earth, then make sure that you tell them this. It is defended.”

  
Suddenly they were all beamed away. They regained awareness in the road at Powell Estate, near where the TARDIS had been. And she stood proudly beside them.

 

“Where are we?” Rose asked.

  
“We're just off Flotsam Road,” Mickey said. “We're just round the corner. We did it!”

  
“Wait, wait, wait,” said Eight, looking up at the sky. Fortunately, the spaceship flew away without further ado.

  
“Go on, my son! Oh, yeah!” cried Mickey for joy.

  
“Yeah! Don't come back!” Rose shouted.

  
“It is defended!” Mickey repeated, right before he and Rose hugged. Then Rose impulsively hugged the translator, who was not expecting it.

 

Eight was not surprised that she made no effort to hug him. In fact, he was relieved; he would have had to put his shields up. And his arms. But evidently not being her type and coming between her and the Doctor she wanted offered him protection.

  
Harriet walked up to Eleven. “My Doctor.”

  
“Prime Minister,” he said, right before they hugged.

  
“So, I become a hugger,” Eight muttered. “Maybe that's not so bad.”

  
“Absolutely the same man,” Harriet said happily. But her smile faded. “Are there many more out there?”

  
“Oh, not just Sycorax. Hundreds of species. Thousands of them. And the human race is drawing attention to itself. Every day you're sending out probes and messages and signals. This planet's so noisy. You're getting noticed more and more. You'd better get used to it.”

 

“But with the Sycorax telling others that the planet is protected, it will reduce the number of potential invasions,” Eight added.

  
“Rose!” cried Jackie, running towards them.

  
“Mum!” Rose rushed to greet her.

  
“And yes, he is an earlier me,” Eleven said to Harriet and her aide. “So he knows what he's talking about.”

  
“Oh, my God! You did it, Rose! Oh!” Jackie cried as they hugged.

  
Harriet's aide's phone rang, and he walked away to answer it.

  
“You did it too!” Rose said. “It was the tea. Fixed his head.”

  
The two Doctors shared a little annoyed look over Rose getting any credit for saving the Earth, but Eleven prevented Eight from speaking. “That was all I needed, cup of tea.”

  
“I said so,” Jackie crowed.

  
“Look at him,” said Rose, as if now fine with how he looked. If she noticed Eight rolling his eyes, or Eleven's tight grin, she gave no sign.

  
“Oh, my God, it's the bleeding Prime Minister!” Jackie said, needing no further convincing that it was the Doctor after what Eight had told her.

  
“Come here, you,” Eleven said to Jackie, and hugged her. It led to a big group hug between Eleven and the three Humans from Powell Estate.

  
“Are you better?” asked Jackie.

  
“I am, yeah,” he agreed.

  
“It's a message from Torchwood,” Eight overheard the translator tell Harriet. “They say they're ready.”

  
“You left me,” Jackie accused.

  
“I'm sorry,” said Rose.

 

“Ready for what?” Eight demanded of Harriet. “What is Torchwood?”

 

While Jackie and Rose kept talking, Harriet looked him in the eye and answered. “Founded by Queen Victoria. There's defensive measures adapted from alien technology. A ship that fell to Earth ten years ago.”

  
“They're leaving. It would be murder,” he insisted, raising his voice.

  
Eleven broke away from the hug. “What would be murder?”

  
“It will be defence,” Harriet countered. “You said yourself, Doctor, they'd go back to the stars and tell others about the Earth. I'm sorry, Doctor, but you're not here all the time. You come and go. It happened today. Mr. Llewellyn and the Major, they were murdered. They died right in front of me while you were sleeping. In which case we have to defend ourselves.”

  
“Britain's Golden Age?” Eleven asked, almost spitting the words out.

  
“It comes with a price,” Harriet insisted.

  
“Perhaps Future Me here gave them the wrong warning. He should've told them to run as fast as they can, run and hide because the monsters are coming. The human race,” Eight said, angrily.

  
“Those are the people I represent,” Harriet said, calm and convinced. “I will do it on their behalf.”

  
“Then I will stop you,” Eleven said.

  
“What does that make you, Doctor? Another alien threat?” she challenged.

 

“Don't challenge us, Harriet Jones, because I'm a completely new man and this earlier me has seen off deadlier threats than what you saw,” Eleven said, cold and quiet. “We could bring down your Government with a single word.”

  
Harriet paused a few seconds. “You're the most remarkable man I've ever met, but I don't think you're quite capable of that.”

  
“No, you're right. Not a single word, just six,” Eleven amended.

  
“I don't think so.”

  
“Six words,” Eleven repeated.

  
“Stop it!” Harriet cried.

  
“Six,” he said, leaning in to whisper. He knew Eight would hear regardless. “Unless you give the command to stand down, I will walk up to your man there, and whoever listens in on his communication will hear this: 'Don't you think she looks tired?' It'll seem like nothing, but it'll feed the rumors and you _will_ lose your position.”

 

“And that will make way for others to seize power,” Eight added. “Others who have less benign intentions for the people of this world. People who just want power. Are you truly willing to chance that, Prime Minister? Because if you trust in the Doctor, you will trust that we would not have let that ship leave if we believed that they would encourage others to invade. Besides, this event raises Earth to a level where the Shadow Proclamation could come after you for interplanetary murder. And they would also impose penalties on the planet. Are you willing to risk bringing that to Earth?”

  
Harriet stood quiet and still as a stone. She considered the matching harsh looks, which proved to her that both men where somehow the same as the man she knew as the Doctor. She took several deep breaths, and finally turned to her aide. “Tell Torchwood to stand down, Alex. The threat is over.”

 

Alex frowned, but spoke into the phone. “Power down the weapons. Seems the danger is over.” They could hear someone protesting on the other end, but Alex was firm. “Those are the Prime Minister's orders. She'll have you sacked if you don't comply.”

 

Within seconds he ended the call. “I heard them power down. Once that command starts they won't be able to use the weapons without starting a new powering cycle, and that requires new authorisation.”

 

“Good,” said Eight. “Now go and deal with the fallout. We have a lot to discuss, Doctor.”

 

/=/=/=/=/=/

 

Eight waited in Eleven's control room while the latter searched for a new outfit. “Lucky man, he gets the whole of the Wardrobe. When I was born I had to seize someone's costume for some New Year's Eve event. At least it fit me, even if I had to borrow shoes from Grace's ex. In the TARDIS borrow sense. Not that I terribly appreciative of the last time I used the Wardrobe.”

 

“The circumstances weren't the best, were they?”

 

Eight turned away from the controls to look at the new Eleven. He took in the brown pinstriped suit, the cream trainers, the overcoat, and the tie. “Feels a bit like the 1940s, doesn't it? And where did we get that coat? I swear I recall seeing it in the Wardrobe.”

 

“Janis Joplin gave it to our Fourth regeneration, remember? We thanked her and promptly put it away once back in the TARDIS. Seems fitting for me. Has plenty of pockets to reach transcendentally larger commodities.”

 

“So, now what are you going to do? You remember my warnings back when you met me as Ten, surely?”

 

Eleven pursed his lips. “Yes. Let's take a walk outside, shall we? Best to discuss it out there.”

 

“Even with random people listening in?”

 

“That's what the sonics are for, aren't they?”

 

Eight saw no reason to argue further, and they headed out. After all, he had all the things he brought with him. Including the medical bag.

  
They walked in the cold but clear night. They looked around the sky. To anyone listening, their speech would be as good as unintelligible as Eleven switched the TARDIS translation circuits to produce Norn, a language spoken in the Orkneys.

 

“If we hadn't talked Harriet Jones into making this... Torchwood place stand down, then the ground would be covered in the ashes of the Sycorax ship,” Eight mused aloud. “And every Human would innocently assume it was snow and play in it, unaware that it made them complicit in a mass murder. We did some good today.”

 

“ _You_ did some good today,” Eleven corrected. “Had it just been me what you described _would have_ happened. All those innocents on that ship owe you their lives.”

  
Eight did not acknowledge that beyond a nod. “What are you going to do?”

 

“Don't you want to avoid spoilers?”

 

“I'm concerned about us keeping with us a girl who tore apart the TARDIS with us. Isn't it dangerous?”

 

“Yes, it is. But... now I have word of how Rose behaved. Even though there are still events that call for her being there, I can use your words against her. You called her out for thinking of me in a romantic way. And got her mother on my side. Now I can tell her that her remaining with me is about helping her grow up.”

 

“But what about... her? She's been in her head. How do you know that she can't make Rose cause more trouble?”

 

“Can anyone ever be certain? It's still not in _her_ interests to make changes. She needs things to happen rather close to how they're supposed to. And if I didn't say so before, thank you for answering that call.”

 

“Ah, yes. Who were those Time Ladies who projected themselves into my TARDIS? They seemed rather young to manage that trick.”

 

Eleven's face beamed in pride. “Oh, they're sometimes traveling companions. Just can't be at present. Best that Rose doesn't face them and vice versa. One of them in particular would have a difficult time keeping the timelines intact; she had trouble with that in the old time-line. Although that wasn't entirely her fault; she had no idea what she really was, and I doubt she ever found out there. As it is, she might attempt to emotionally or psychologically destroy Rose if given the chance. And as much as Rose would benefit from being forced to choose between remaining broken and rebuilding herself as an adult, the time-lines prohibit it. For now,” he added, quietly and sadly.

 

Eight groaned. “So, I still have to look forward to being in your shoes. And what is the point of wearing trainers with a suit?”

 

“Easier to run in. You know how much running happens in our lives.”

 

“Wait, wait wait!,” Eight demanded, stopping them right by the stairs leading up to the Tyler flat. “Doctor, are they family?”

 

Eleven looked him in the eye, po-faced. “You know I can't answer that one way or the other.”

 

“But we do have a family again?” Eight insisted. “What about that prophecy about someone important to me dying and causing _my_ death?”

  
“Trust me,” Eleven said, clasping his arm. “Don't worry about it. Just deal with whatever is coming your way and know that somehow we will find the right actions to take. Not to mention the right companions when the time comes.”

 

Eight nodded reluctantly. “I suppose I can't expect anything more than that.”

 

“Going to come up and say goodbye to Jackie and Mickey?”

 

“Yeah, I need to thank Jackie for the tea and Mickey for his help.” As they climbed the stairs, Eight asked, “Do you think Rose grasped who I am?”

 

“She tends to blank on things that don't fit her view. I doubt she'll remember. Or wish to. Not when you've given her a set-down that she needed.”

 

“Oh,” Eight said, drawing out the psychic paper. “Here.”

 

“Nah,” Eleven said, shaking his head. “Keep it,” he insisted, briefly drawing his own version of the paper out of a pocket. It was the same one, only aged. “After all, that's how we got it in the first place. It was stolen off that CIA agent, but we claimed finder's rights given how useful it's proved.”

 

“Well, thank you,” Eight said, tucking his new item away.

 

Eleven opened the door and found the Tylers and Mickey enjoying Christmas crackers, and wearing silly hats. “Oh, come to join us?” asked Jackie warmly, as she placed food on the table.

 

“No, neither of us can eat the food,” Eleven reminded her. “My friend has come to say goodbye before he's off to his next assignment. After all, this is a brand new planet Earth. No denying the existence of aliens now. Everyone saw it. Everything's new.”

 

Eight laughed. “Oh, there are plenty who will continue to deny it.”

  
Rose looked at Eleven. “And what about you? What are you going to do next?”

  
“Well, back to the TARDIS,” he answered, matter-of-factly. “Same old life.”

 

“On your own?” she asked softly.

  
“Why, don't you want to come with me?”

 

Eight hoped that she would refuse.

  
“Well, yeah.”

 

No such luck.

  
Eleven was skeptical. “Do you, though?”

  
“Yeah!” she insisted.

  
“See, my friend here wasn't so sure. He told me about how you reacted when I changed.”

  
Rose gave Eight a sharp glare before she turned a pleading look on Eleven. “Yeah, I thought, because you changed you might not want me anymore.”

  
“Well, I am a different man. But I do want one thing clear. You're coming as a friend _and_ my foster daughter. You're still a child and need to respect me as the authority inside the TARDIS and everywhere we go. Understood?”

 

Rose's eyes widened. She clearly did not like his words, but it seemed that the travel was too important to her. Or the getting away part. “Okay.”

  
Mickey sighed. “You're never going to stay, are you?”

  
“There's just so much out there,” Rose answered. “So much to see. I've got to.”

  
“Yeah,” Mickey said, exchanging a sort of groaning look with Eight. He clearly understood, even if he would one day be the same man.

  
“Well, I reckon you're mad, the pair of you,” Jackie said, clearly put out. “It's like you go looking for trouble.”

  
“Trouble's just the bits in-between. It's all waiting out there, Jackie, and it's brand new to me. All those planets, and creatures and horizons. I haven't seem them yet! Not with these eyes. And it is going to be fantastic. No, wait, I need a new word.”

 

“You'll find it,” Eight said. “You always do.”

  
“That hand of yours still gives me the creeps,” Rose said, eying it.

 

“Well, then I won't be holding hands with you again,” Eleven mused aloud. “Unless it's to keep you with me in times of trouble.”

 

“On that note, I'll take my leave,” Eight interjected. He turned and smiled. “Thank you, Jackie and Mickey. You were both brilliant.”

 

Jackie gave him a warm smile. “Thank you, for making me feel like I can do something important.”

 

“Same here,” Mickey said.

 

“Then I see I have a big act to follow,” Eleven teased, a playful glare tossed at Eight. Even if he did appreciate how Eight did them the power of good when he couldn't.

 

“Until next time,” he said, leaving and not acknowledging Rose. Given her glare at him, he doubted he would have received much of a goodbye. And he did not want a repeat of the last time.

 

He waited until he was down the stairs and out of sight before he activated the Vortex Manipulator. On finding himself back inside his TARDIS he breathed a sigh of relief.

 

Suddenly he felt that he was not alone. Again. He turned and saw the same two ladies.

 

“Thank you,” the ginger said. “Time is back on track.”

  
“Come for the items, have you?” Eight asked.

 

“Of course,” said the dark-haired girl. “We need them back.”

 

“Take them,” he said, removing the manipulator and placing it and the medical bag on the ground halfway between them.

 

The dark-haired girl took them back as the ginger said, “Keep alert, Doctor. Time is still in flux, and there are still more Time Crashes ahead. We will meet again.”

 

“But-”

 

They vanished.

 

Eight huffed. “Typical Time Lord behavior. Even if they are in the right for avoiding spoilers. But who are they? The ginger, I've seen something of her features in the Untempered Schizm. And the other, why does she have features that remind me of my Fifth incarnation apart from the dark hair? _Who are they to me?!_ ”

 

The TARDIS' lack of chiming or any sounds said that even she was ignorant. And that alarmed him even more.


	10. A Waste of Potential

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Showdown time in the Library. Although River gives Eight some food for thought.

_The Library_

_51st Century_

 

River stood in the middle of the rotunda she had led the remaining members to after she got her sonic back. She spent most of her time scanning the shadows, and felt lucky that none were showing signs of being dangerous. It was likely a matter of time before one of them changed and the rest of the swarm caught up with them.

 

She was also grateful that no one had asked her any further questions about the Doctor's intense distrust of her. She was trying to reconcile what she remembered from both her experiences and the many times she had researched the Doctor's past. After all, there was only so much time she could spend in his company before they had to part ways. But things were not making sense at all, and she needed more time to figure out an alternative way to convince this Doctor to trust her.

 

But did she have that time? The Vashta Nerada were a threat she had thought was one of the rare _story_ stories in her research, as in not based on reality. If that was wrong, then what other assumptions had she made that were wrong? The Doctor was not supposed to remember her this soon in his timeline. That much she had been sure of. What changed that?

 

When she suspected that Lux's patience was wearing thin she sighed and finally spoke. “You know, it's funny, I keep wishing the Doctor was here.”

  
Anita, her visor still dark, asked a puzzled question. “The Doctor is here, isn't he? He is coming back, right?”

  
River sighed, unaware of the person hiding between the shadows above them. “You know when you see a photograph of someone you know, but it's from years before you knew them? And it's like they're not quite finished. They're not done yet. Well, yes, the Doctor's here. He came when I called, just like he always does. But not my Doctor. Now my Doctor; I've seen whole armies turn and run away. And he'd just swagger off back to his TARDIS and open the doors with a snap of his fingers. The Doctor in the TARDIS. Next stop, everywhere.”

 

“Spoilers.” The Doctor was grimly pleased when all three practically jumped at the sound of his voice. He rushed down the stairs, saying, “Nobody can open a TARDIS by snapping their fingers. It doesn't work like that.”

  
“It does for the Doctor,” River said.

  
“I am the Doctor,” Eight said. “Or have you forgotten?”

  
River sighed. “Yeah. Some day you'll be my-”

  
“Don't. I'm not _your_ Doctor and never will be. And as for your comments; have you ever considered how insulting that is to all the mes there have been? And the ones between this me and the one you apparently know?”

 

“What do you mean?”

 

“No one is ever finished until they die. If each of the mes from my past could be here they would all be insulted by your dismissal of them. Someone who I would willingly choose would have enough respect to leave any insults to me. I'm the only one who can get away with insulting a past or future Doctor, and how do you know that you've seen me at my final instant alive? Only if you had could you say that you knew me when I was finished. And I'm taking your reaction that you haven't seen me die my final death.”

 

River shook her head. She did not want to get into the memories of when she had killed him in that alternate timeline. But a frown crossed her face. “Not a final death, but... the memories... they're not as strong as they once were.”

 

“Which means the changes I made are still having affects on Time. Which means... you and I aren't the fixed point you claim we are. Now, if you want to survive today you will remember my warning from earlier. How are you lot doing?” he asked the rest of the team.

  
“Where's Other Dave?” River asked.

  
The Doctor glared at her. “Not coming. Sorry. You shouldn't have made him stay with me.”

 

River lowered her gaze in the face of his accusing glare. That death was definitely her fault.

  
“Well, if they've taken him, why haven't they gotten me yet?” Anita asked, desperation tinging her voice.

  
“I don't know. Maybe tinting your visor's making a difference.”

 

But even as the Doctor spoke, he was not confident in that answer. Anita still had two shadows, but the one he knew was from the Vashta Nerada was much smaller than before. Was she already dead and Anita was somehow – mercifully, perhaps – unaware?

  
“It's making a difference all right,” Anita continued. “No one's ever going to see my face again.”

  
There was nothing he could say to that. “Can I get you anything?”

  
“An old age would be nice. Anything you can do?”

  
The Doctor smiled slightly. “I'm all over it.”

  
“Doctor,” Anita said, her tone making it clear she was changing the subject. “When we first met you, you didn't trust Professor Song. But she trusts you and wanted to whisper some word in your ear to convince you to trust her. My life so far; I could do with a word like that. What did you want to say, Professor? Give a dead girl a break. Your secrets are safe with me.”

  
River shook her head, tears running down her face. “I can't... I can't... I can't remember now.”

 

But the Doctor barely noticed her hesitation or confused expression. “Safe,” he repeated.

  
“What?” Anita asked.

  
“Safe. You don't say 'saved'. Nobody says 'saved'. You say 'safe'. The data fragment!” the Doctor exclaimed. “What did it say?”

  
Lux could recite it easily. “Four thousand and twenty two people saved. No survivors.”

  
River did know when a breakthrough was about to happen. “Doctor?”

  
“That's it! Nobody says 'saved'. Nutters say 'saved'. You say 'safe'. You see, it didn't mean 'safe'. It meant, it literally meant, 'saved'!” He rushed to a control platform and ran a new scan. “Let's see, what will I find now that I know what I'm looking for? Aha!”

 

River came closer, but still kept a little distance. She worried about what he was capable of if she was not careful.

 

“See, there it is, right there,” the Doctor declared in triumph. “A hundred years ago, massive power surge. All the teleports going at once. Soon as the Vashta Nerada hit their hatching cycle, they attacked. Someone hit the alarm. The computer tried to teleport everyone out.”  
  
“It tried to teleport four thousand twenty two people?” River blurted in disbelief.

  
“Not tried. It succeeded. Pulled them all out, but then what? There was nowhere to send them. Nowhere safe in the whole library with Vashta Nerada growing in every shadow. Four thousand and twenty two people all beamed up and nowhere to go. They're stuck in the system, waiting to be sent, like emails. So what is a computer to do? It does what a computer always does.”

  
River smiled in comprehension. “It saved them.”

  
The Doctor pushed aside some books to use random papers left on the nearby table, and drew on them to explain his findings. “The Library. A whole world of books, and right at the core, the biggest hard drive in history. The index to everything ever written, backup copies of every single book. The computer saved four thousand and twenty two people the only way a computer can. It saved them to the hard drive. Remarkable ability when you think about it.”

 

Suddenly an alarm blared loudly.

  
Lux looked around rapidly. “What is it? What's wrong?”

  
A female computer voice announced, “Auto-destruct enabled in twenty minutes.”

 

River noticed something strange on the screen. “What's maximum erasure?”

  
The Doctor tried running a scan. “In twenty minutes, this planet is going to crack like an egg.”

  
Lux shook his head. “No. No, it's all right. The Doctor Moon will stop it. It's programmed to protect CAL.”

 

Except the terminal screen turned blank. The Doctor slapped the side of the monitor. “No, no, no!”

  
“All library systems are permanently offline,” the computer said in that utterly polite tone that all automated systems had, which was infinitely more annoying than an impolite tone. “Sorry for any inconvenience. Shortly-”

  
“We need to stop this,” Lux cried in a panic. “We've got to save CAL.”

  
“Well, what is it? What is CAL?” the Doctor demanded.

  
“We need to get to the main computer,” Lux said, resolve on his face. “I'll show you.”

  
“It's at the core of the planet,” the Doctor said. “What's the fastest way down?”

 

“The anti-gravity lift,” Lux said. “It's right below the family crest”

  
“Well, then. Let's go,” River said, grabbing her sonic and pointed it the Library logo in the middle of the compass rose in the floor. It opened to reveal their method of transport. “Guess you did memorise some of the schematics after all,” she speculated aloud.

  
The Doctor's eyes widened. “Convenient. So, you have some usefulness.”

  
River laughed as they all stepped onto the platform. “Oh, I'm more than useful. You actually like me.”

 

“Don't push your luck,” he warned as the platform moved them steadily down to the core.

 

Once they arrived and stepped off, they heard the Computer announce, “Auto-destruct in fifteen minutes.”

  
The Doctor looked up and around them. Above them was a giant globe with swirling energy in it. “So that's the data core. Over four thousand living minds trapped inside it. Maybe Donna's in there.”

  
“Yeah, well, they won't be living for much longer. We're running out of time,” River said.

 

The Doctor located an access terminal and opened it. He was working on it when a new voice stopped him cold.

  
“Help me. Please, help me.”

  
“What's that?” Anita asked.

  
“Was that a child?” River added at the sound of a girl's voice.

  
The Doctor frowned deeply. “The computer's in sleep mode. I can't wake it up. I'm trying.” He kept tapping at the keyboard, and he blinked hard. “This makes no sense.”

  
River watched over his shoulder, equally transfixed. “Doctor, these readings.”

  
“I know. You'd think it was dreaming.”

  
“It is dreaming, of a normal life, and a lovely Dad, and of every book ever written,” Lux said quietly.

  
“Computers don't dream,” Anita insisted.

  
“Help me,” called the girl's voice. “Please help me.”

  
Lux shook his head. “No, but little girls do.” He pulled a breaker and a door opened. They rushed inside to find a huge interface with a chair in one side of the room. A special helmet hung above it.

 

As they entered, a node turned to face them. The face of a girl who could not have been more than ten-years-old was on it. “Please help me. Please help me,” she pleaded.

  
River paled. “Oh, my God.”

  
“It's the little girl,” Anita said, shocked awe in her voice. “The girl we saw in the computer.”

  
Lux's voice was calm, reverent and respectful. “She's not in the computer. In a way, she is the computer. The main command node. This is CAL.”

  
“CAL is a child?” the Doctor complained, aghast. “A child hooked up to a mainframe? Why didn't you tell me this? I needed to know this!” he shouted.

  
“Because she's family!” Lux snapped, upset. He turned and lowered his voice as he looked at the girl's face “CAL. Charlotte Abigail Lux. My grandfather's youngest daughter. She was dying, so he built her a library and put her living mind inside, with a moon to watch over her, and all of human history to pass the time. Any era to live in, any book to read. She loved books more than anything, and he gave her them all. He asked only that she be left in peace. A secret, not a freak show.”

  
This the Doctor could understand completely. “So you weren't protecting a patent, you were protecting her.”

  
Lux stroked the girl's face, his aunt's face. “This is only half a life, of course. But it's for ever.”

  
“And then the shadows came,” the Doctor mused aloud.

  
“The shadows,” the CAL node whimpered. “I have to. I have to save. Have to save.”

  
“And she saved them,” the Doctor mused. “She saved everyone in the library. Folded them into her dreams and kept them safe.”

  
“Then why didn't she tell us?” Anita asked.

  
The Doctor thought quickly. “Because she's forgotten. She's got over four thousand living minds chatting away inside her head. It must be like being, well, me.”

  
“So what do we do?” River asked in a panic.

  
“Auto-destruct in ten minutes,” the Computer voice reminded them.

 

The Doctor thought hard about the options. “Well, it's obvious. We have to beam all the people out of the data core. The computer will reset and stop the countdown. The difficult part is that Charlotte doesn't have enough memory space left to make the transfer.” He had an idea, and kept an eye on River's reaction. “I'll hook myself up to the computer. She can borrow my memory space.”

  
River looked incredulously at him. “Difficult? It'll kill you stone dead.”

  
He did not acknowledge her before he hurried over to another control area. “Got a better idea?”

  
“It'll burn out both your hearts and I don't think you'll regenerate,” River pleaded

  
“I always try my hardest not to die. If you knew me, then you would know it is my biggest talent.”

  
“Doctor!” she cried.

  
“Unless you have another idea, then I'm right and this works. So, shut up and listen to me. You and Lux, go back up to the main library. Prime any data cells you can find for maximum download, and be ready to send the survivors to the ships. And before you say anything else, Professor, if I may be so bold to mention in passing, you are a despicable character.”

  
River cried incoherently. “Oh! I hate you sometimes.”

  
“In the words of one man who I did underestimate, 'do I care'?”

 

Arnold Korns would have approved of the imitation given the circumstances, the Doctor suspected. So would have Pat, Flo, and Lucie.

  
“Mr. Lux, with me. Anita, if he dies, I'll kill him!” River cried, leading Lux out of the room.

 

“Why do they always say that?” the Doctor muttered. “It wouldn't make a difference.”

  
“What about the Vashta Nerada?” Anita asked.

  
“These are their forests. I'm going to seal Charlotte inside her little world, take everybody else away. The shadows can swarm to their hearts' content.”

 

Although he questioned how long they would last without fresh meat. A very good concern, and one best not verbalized. No one was quite certain how long a Vashta Nerada life cycle ran, but he hoped that they would have to begin turning on each other to keep going. Eventually the Library might become usable again, but it could take a very long time. IF his hopes came true, and it might take longer since they had just eaten.

  
“So, you think they're just going to let us go?”

  
“That is the best offer they're going to get,” the Doctor said, flat and harsh as he hurried in the setup for the transfer.

  
“You're going to make 'em an offer?” Anita asked in disbelief.

  
“They had better take it, because right now, I'm finding it very difficult to make any kind of offer at all. And you know what?” He looked up at her. “I really liked Anita. She was brave, even when she was crying. And she never gave in. And you ate her.” He aimed the sonic and undid his earlier work. Her visor cleared, revealing a skull. Proving he knew she was already dead.

 

The skeleton remained upright in the suit.

  
“But I'm going to let that pass, just as long as you let them pass,” he added.

  
Skeletal Anita was silent for a few seconds. “How long have you known?”

  
“I counted the shadows. You only have one now. She's nearly gone. For once, you are going to be kind.”

  
“These are our forests. We are not kind,” Skeletal Anita said on behalf of the Vastha Nerada.

  
“I'm giving you back your forests, but you are giving me them. You are letting them go,” he said, adjusting the setting on the sonic. “Because I've dealt with your kind twice before, and I've been developing an idea on how to deal with you.”

  
“These are our forests. They are our meat.” Skeletal Anita reached out a hand, and shadows stretched out towards the Doctor.

 

He did not blink. He merely aimed the sonic and pressed a button. The blue light pulsed brightly, and the Shadows stopped, smoking on the edges where they had met the light pulse. “Don't play games with me. You just killed someone I liked. That is not a safe place to stand, so I just fried a few thousand of you to make my point. I'm the Doctor, and you're in the biggest library in the universe. Look me up. My only promise is that I will seek to spread knowledge of you, so your forests on other worlds are left in peace.”

 

He could not be bothered to hide the triumph. He hated developing weapons, but this was now potentially useful in holding a swarm at bay. The concentrated UV light setting. He had known it was great for sanitizing hands and eliminating bacteria on meat. So it seemed natural to test it against fungal spores, which is what the Vashta Nerada were. But he had to make that last offer, to appease his instinct to preserve life and the rights of innocent life-forms; not all Vashta Nerada had turned like this, and perhaps not all would if he had anything to say about it.

  
All was still for a few seconds, and then the shadows withdrew back into Anita's spacesuit. “You have one day,” said her voice before the spacesuit collapsed.

  
River returned in time to see it. “Oh, Anita,” she cried.

  
“She's been dead for a while now. Another death that's your fault.” Uneasy about her being back, he grabbed the squareness gun as backup. “I told you to go!”

  
“Lux can manage without me, but you can't,” River said, staying back but steeling herself. “Listen, that book you took from me? It was my journal, and I got it from you. I just wrote on the last page today, and I had a prophecy that on the day I wrote the last entry I would die. You don't trust me and said I deserve to die for leading this expedition to their deaths. I certainly deserve it for nearly causing Donna Noble's death. So, let me give my life to save those thousands, including your dear friend. Neither Time nor the Universe can afford to lose either of you!”

  
He thought for a few seconds, stunned by the bluntness and willingness to do what he had intended her to do in the first place. Never mind the implication of Donna's importance. “Well, it suits me fine. Now, get to it!”

 

River nodded, drew out her sonic and went to the chair. She sat in it and began adjusting the wires.

 

They worked mostly in silence, only speaking enough to communicate what needed doing.

  
“Auto-destruct in three minutes,” the Computer announced.

  
The Doctor looked up from his work within seconds. “Well, there's nothing more I can do on my end. Are you finished with those wires?”

  
“Nearly,” River said, finishing twisting the wires in her hands. “I suppose my career had to end one day, right?”

  
“Why did you focus so much on me? Why do you persist in this belief that you're so connected with me?”

 

He was trying for anger, but it came out more sad than anything else. Now the loss of potential was hitting him hard. In any other situation he would be trying to find an alternative to save her life. And he could not reconcile the idea of giving her a journal and letting her have that impression about her future. What did that say about his future selves?  
  


River put down the wires, setting them into place. “After all your protests about spoilers, you still want to know?”

 

“This is not a joke. You know too much to have not been in the TARDIS, although I can't figure out why that gun was in the Old Girl in the first place. I have difficulty believing that I would give you something that would practically indicate when you were going to die. Seems rather harsh, doesn't it?”

  
“I suppose,” she sighed. “Perhaps it was a sign that I should have paid more attention to. I'm timing it for the end of the countdown. There'll be a blip in the command flow. That way it should improve our chances of a clean download.”

  
“River, stop changing the subject. Why should I ever trust someone who wiped my memory seven times?”

  
She ignored his question yet again, but this time felt justified. “Funny thing is, this means you've always known how I was going to die. All the time we've been together, you knew I was coming here. The last time I saw you, the real – the future you, I mean, you turned up on my doorstep, with a new haircut and a suit.”

 

“No spoilers, River,” he snapped. “I don't want to know where I took you or what happened.”

 

“Auto-destruct in two minutes,” said the computer.

 

“Oh, have a little respect for a dying woman!” River cried.

 

“Anita was worthy of that respect,” Eight retorted, gritting his teeth and forcing the words out. “She showed dignity even when facing certain death, and thought of others before herself. Even her request for some comfort was respectful.”

 

River's eyes flashed daggers at him, mixed with tears. “You didn't just have everything you ever believed about your past upended. You didn't just discover that the person you thought you would be married to had an entirely different motivation for giving the impression that it might happen: to preserve the time-lines so you would arrive at your death at the right rime. You didn't discover that what you thought was your history with the one you loved was all a lie told by the person you thought loved you when they in fact never trusted you fully because you unknowingly treated their family wrong.”

 

Eight's mouth slackened.

 

She continued to sniffle, tears running freely down her face.“I understand now. You always kept me at a distance, never quite letting me in like I thought my memories said you would. But now it makes sense. Two different time-lines competing in my head. While I have memories of you telling me your name, I can't remember it now. Not since you stopped me from whispering it into your ear.”

  
“Auto-destruct in one minute,” the computer announced.

  
“You wouldn't tell me why you and your family kept me at a distance, and I never understood why you gave me a sonic,” she continued in a rush. “Or why you cried. I now know why you were distant. You were merely keeping time on track, and your regrets were for what you couldn't do for me. You knew it was time for me to come to the Library. Whatever you did that allowed you to be the Doctor I met here, it re-wrote time. And... I now feel like it changed things.”

  
“Changed what?” the Doctor demanded, her one word hitting him hard.

  
“I can't say. Because you're right. What I remembered wasn't right or fair for either of us. But it's okay. It's not over for you. You'll see me again. You've got all of that to come. You and me, time and space. You watch us run.”  
  
“Auto-destruct in ten,” the Computer announced.

 

The Doctor turned somber as River moved the helmet over her head. “River.”

  
The Computer continued over him, “Nine, eight, seven.”

  
“What do you mean, my family?!”

  
“Hush, now,” River said quietly, picking up two power cables.

  
“Four, three-”

  
“I forgive you,” River whispered.

 

As the computer finished the countdown River joined the two power cables together. The Doctor had to hide his eyes from a blinding light.

 

Seconds later, he opened his eyes again. Where River had been, there was now a skeleton in the suit. But there were traces of flesh and other organs, unlike with the Vashta Nerada victims.

 

He remained still for several long seconds before standing, a lone tear falling from his eye. “Maybe I cried because I failed to transform you into someone good.”

 

“Remarkable insight.”

 

The Doctor jumped to face the newcomer. He frowned at the sight of the gray-haired man in a torn and rather holey suit. The most distinctive features were the eyebrows. “Who are you?”

 

The man smiled. “If you could recognise Ten by smell, surely you can recognise me.”

 

Eight's jaw slackened. “I _am_ slipping. Which one are you?”

 

“The one who redirected her message,” he answered. “Beyond that, it's best you don't know more. I just came from where I last saw River, and... I tried one last time to help her transform into something good. In honor of her parents.”

 

“And we failed?”

 

He nodded. “Still, we had to make the effort.”

 

“So why are you here?”

 

The Future Doctor moved to River's suit and took the neural relay from her neck. “I couldn't help her in life because she wasn't willing to change. She saw no reason to.” He took out his sonic, which looked remarkably different from Eight's. The green head was nothing like any sonic he had seen before.

 

As the future Doctor attached the relay to the sonic and put it against part of the controls, Eight figured it out. “You're uploading her into CAL's memory banks.”

 

“She'll join the rest of the expedition,” Future Doctor said. “I'm making sure she can't communicate with the outside world, and that no scan of the system will find her. I'm hiding her within another subroutine. It will allow her to become the shining person her parents always wished she would become.”

 

CAL smiled as he removed the sonic and tossed the empty relay aside. “Melody Pond-Williams has been saved.”

 

Eight blinked. “Is that her real name?”

 

“And you're going to pretend to forget that,” the Future Doctor said as he took River's sonic. “Now, I need her journal and gun.”

 

“Why?”

 

“Because you don't need to know anything more about her yet,” he said, fixing a hint of a 'be reasonable' look that all versions of the Doctor were masters at. “I can tell you that she will never again attempt to wipe our mind. You'll be safe from any further contact until you become the Doctor she knew best.”

 

Eight was not keen to follow the instructions, but he did not want to be in contact with either item. So, he handed them over.

 

“Thank you. Now, go upstairs and find Donna. She's going to need you after what she went through. You'll need each other,” the Future Doctor added before touching a Vortex Manipulator that Eight had not noticed.

 

Eight remained silent as the Future Doctor disappeared. Then he sighed and hurried for the main area. And Donna.


	11. Some Answers, Many More Questions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eight reunites with Donna. Both are in for surprises.

_The Library_

_51st Century_

 

The Doctor made it safely to the main teleport area, using the sonic to trace Donna's DNA and temporal signature. Once he picked up the trace he hurried to locate her. What had his future self meant? And why did he refuse to indicate which him he was? Was he the final incarnation?

 

At last, he saw her at a terminal, running some scan. “Donna!”

 

Her head popped up, revealing tears and a pale look. “Doctor,” she breathed, abandoning her search to run to him.

 

They met about halfway, forcing others to dodge them. Only the hug with Lucie when she had been a captive of the Ice Warriors was as tight. “It's so good to see you,” he choked, surprised by how tight his vocal chords felt and unable to do anything about it. “I thought you had died.”

 

She had buried her face into his jacket, and barely lifted it to talk. “The computer; it made me think I'd never met you. Like most of my life was a lie. It kept making me forget when I came close to remembering. And that's not the worst of it.”

 

The Doctor drew back, aiming for eye contact. “What could be worse than making you forget?”

 

Donna's tears resumed. “Things happened like on the telly, moving from one instant to another. It introduced me to someone, and then soon after that it made me believe I had been married to him for over seven years and had twins.”

 

He stilled. “It gave you a husband and children?”

 

She nodded. “The images of the children, they were a repeating pattern. I don't think they were real,” she choked.

 

He closed his eyes and drew her back into the hug. “Oh, Donna. You loved them, so that makes them real.”

 

Donna sniffled, not wanting to let go of this connection to the real world. “But what about the man; Lee? Was he real?”

 

Hearing a name made him pull back, but he covered it by keeping his hands on her arms. “Is that what you were doing; looking for him?”

 

“Yeah,” she whispered. “I need to know. Was he a victim of the system, or was he constructed like the children were?”

 

He felt his hearts sink into his stomach. Why he had no idea. But he could not ignore her distress. “I'll help you.”

 

He joined her at the computer, ignoring the motions of people getting onto the teleports to board the ships.

  
“Please be patient,” they heard the computer say. “Only three can teleport at a time. Do not state your intended destination until you arrive in your designated slot.”

  
After several more attempts, Donna sighed heavily. “There wasn't even anyone called Lee in the library that day. I suppose he could have had a different name out here, but, let's be honest, he wasn't real, was he?”

  
The Doctor thought about what might be the best thing to say, and found only blanks. He sighed. “Maybe. Maybe not. We may never know.”

  
Donna's tears had stopped, but the drawn distress remained. “I made up the perfect man. Gorgeous, adores me, and hardly able to speak a word. What's that say about me?”

  
“Nothing, Donna.”

 

She looked at him, startled by the force in his tone.

 

“It means nothing. CAL's systems had to make you all forget or the pressure might have taxed her abilities. The near destruction would have happened sooner. The programs made assumptions about what you would like. But even though they could make you forget memories they could not make you forget the impressions life with me made on your psyche.”

  
“Stand right in the middle of the teleport, please,” they heard a woman saying to a trio getting onto the teleports. “Keep your hands and feet inside at all times.”

  
“What about you?” Donna asked, ignoring the continued words of the woman. “What happened?”

  
The Doctor took a deep breath, the memory of River's final words before her death haunting him. “Not here. In the TARDIS.”

  
“Are you all right?”

  
“What? How could either of us be all right after this?”

  
“If you are pregnant, please go to teleport seven on the floor above-”

  
Donna spoke over the woman. “I mean, is 'all right' special Time Lord code for 'really not all right at all'?”

  
He thought about it. “Yes.” No point in denying it.

  
“Because I'm all right, too,” she said softly.

  
The Doctor sighed and held out his hand. “Come on.”

  
She took his hand, and they turned to walk to where the TARDIS was. But before they got far, they heard a man's voice.

 

“D-D-D-Donna!”

 

The Doctor saw the shock on Donna's face as her head whipped around to face the source. He also turned and saw a dark-haired man stepping off the teleport to walk towards Donna.

 

“Donna, is that...?”

 

“Yes,” she answered weakly, not letting go of his hand.

 

Lee came over and hugged her, pushing the Doctor aside. The Doctor's lips pursed and his eyes narrowed. He never liked being shoved aside, but he did not speak. Why was he feeling his hearts clenching like they were going to keep him from breathing?

 

Donna did not return the hug. She was stock still until she gently drew herself away.

 

Lee blinked. “D-Donna?”

 

She looked up at him with wet eyes and sorrow. “Lee, I'm from another time. I have family waiting for me, and we weren't given a choice in whether we wanted to be together. I'm not quite the person you thought you knew, because I didn't remember my real life. I'm sorry, but we're not meant to be.”

 

The Doctor took a deep breath, only then realizing that he  _ had _ stopped breathing.

 

Donna shook her head and waved gently. “Goodbye, Lee. Please have a wonderful life,” she choked. Then she grabbed the Doctor's hand and hurried them both out.

 

There were no further words from Lee. Or none that even the Doctor's ears could ear. They remained silence until they had reached the entry area where the TARDIS was.

 

The Doctor stopped suddenly, thinking back over what had happened and been said.

 

“What?” Donna asked, finally speaking for the first time since telling Lee goodbye.

 

“Professor Song made a claim about the TARDIS. I'm going to test it.” He let go of Donna's hand and raised his into snapping position. Then he snapped his fingers.

 

The TARDIS' outer doors opened, and they could see the inner doors also open.

  
Donna's mouth dropped. “So that woman, Professor Song. She said you could do that?”

 

“Yeah. And I never knew.”

 

“Handy,” she commented. “Now let's get out of here and have some tea. And talk.”

 

/=/=/=/=/=/

 

About an hour later they were in the sitting area the TARDIS had created for Donna, attached to what passed for the kitchen. She had made the tea and rustled up some biscuits for them both from the Doctor's collection. The good chocolate ones, that he admitted to limiting to bad days.

 

Finally, after some time in silence, Donna began her questions. “Professor Song, she knew you in the future, but she didn't know me. What happens to me? Because when she heard my name, the way she looked at me.”

 

“I don't want to know, Donna,” he answered. “I had her diary, but a future me came after she'd died. He took it, and her sonic and gun.”

 

“No surprise she had a gun.”

 

“I could have looked into my future, I could have looked you up. But that's not possible now. What do you think? If we still had the opportunity, should we have peeked at the end?”

  
Donna thought about it for a few seconds and then shook her head. “Spoilers, right?”

  
“Right,” he agreed. “I know too much sometimes, as it is.”

 

“Doctor, I'll tell you more about what happened to me, and then I want you to tell me exactly what happened after you tried to teleport me to the TARDIS.”

  
He was not thrilled about it, and he knew he could not admit to what he had said about her. But he also knew that he needed to ask her some questions. “Okay, okay, okay. I'm ready to move on to the next chapter anyway.”

  
So they talked. First she shared the story created for her. “It was what I always thought I wanted, but something was always not quite right about it,” she admitted in the end. “Like I knew on some level that it wasn't real. Or that what I wanted in a family had changed. I don't know which.”

 

Then it was his turn. While he kept from admitting that he had said he would chose Donna as his wife, he held back little else. Every hash word he had spoken to River, every time he nearly threatened her for what he saw as her murder of Donna and himself.

 

Donna's expression hardened a little during his tale, but she remained silent until he finished. And then for a bit after.

 

She was silent long enough to make the Doctor uneasy. Could she tell that he had left things out? “Donna, please say something. Even if you think I was too hard on her.”

 

“In some ways, yes. Good in everyone, remember? Even in a teenage girl who you suspect is connected to She-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. We don't know enough about what River did to know how we should have treated her, but I don't condone any of her actions towards you. She had no right to wipe your memories or to attempt to entrap you into marriage. But it seems that you managed to alter that by merely refusing to let her whisper into your ear.”

 

He nodded. “And I can't begin to say how relieved I am that she forgot my name. That means I should be safe from marrying her. Unless some future me feels so sorry for her that he does it anyway.”

 

“I doubt it. You've been pushed into too many things in life. You would never marry someone who didn't respect you enough to trust you. And being that reckless? That forceful in trying to tell you something that would create a fixed point? She had feelings for you, no question about that, but it was not true love.”

 

“What is true love, Donna? So many claim to know, but I've never understood it. Familial love, that I understand. I've been a father, grandfather, and even a great-grandfather.”

 

Donna's eyes widened, but she remained silent. She just nodded, wordlessly encouraging him to continue.

 

He appreciated her quiet, and continued his question. “Time was that I never endured the interested attentions of someone else. Closest I came in my first incarnation was accidentally becoming engaged by drinking hot chocolate.”

 

“How does that equal becoming engaged?”

 

“Aztec traditions. May I finish my question?”

 

She scoffed. “You'll finish that story later, Sunshine.”

 

“Okay, okay, okay,” he promised. “As I was saying, I used to never see anyone interested in me. And too often when someone did express an interest they had their own agenda. How do you know what true love is?”

 

“Never been interested in someone in that way?” Donna asked.

 

“In what way?” he queried, puzzled.

 

Donna sighed and thought about it. “Well, most people, when they talk about love, they really mean infatuation. You've been around Humans enough to hear about lust and infatuation, haven't you? You do know what those words mean?”

 

“Yes, I think so.”

 

“Prove it. Describe them.”

 

The Doctor frowned as he thought about it. “Well, lust is merely about the physical aspects of the object of the feelings. Infatuation is some sort of consuming emotion focused on another person, and it's often accompanied by mistaken beliefs about what the other feels about them.”

 

Donna nodded slowly. “You're accurate enough. But the biggest thing is that they're fleeting. So is flirting. It's an attention-getter, but it doesn't necessarily mean anything. Anyone can flirt with anyone. But to place the other's well-being above yours? To wish to be mutually supportive to each other? To value their company so much that you want it for the rest of your days? That's part of it. It's about trust, respect for what the other brings and their unique traits, and bringing out the best in each other. You make each other feel better able to handle whatever comes, and you are witnesses to each other's lives. And from watching my parents, I can tell you that love is as much of a decision as instinct. It feels right to be with the person, and you make the decision daily to be a loving partner to them.”

 

His eyes widened as her explanation finished.

 

Donna frowned. “Are your people that emotionally constipated that you can't even recognise the emotions?”

 

He winced, although his eyes did not go back to normal. “Well, emotional displays and influences were extremely discouraged, to say the least. You've seen the High Council.”

 

“Yeah, they were a right joy to be around. I can see why you fled.” She finished her tea and sighed. “I don't know about you, but I need a lot of rest after today. Promise me that you'll get some rest yourself. You look like you went to hell and back. Not to mention stayed there for a while.”

 

He nodded. “Okay. I will.”

 

She gave him a narrow look. “Swear on our friendship. You need a good night's sleep if we're going to carry on with running into danger.”

 

“I promise, Donna. I don't want to create any unnecessary problems for us. I'll put away the tea.”

 

“Okay. Good night,” she said, pushing herself to standing.

 

“Good night,” he answered, watching her leave the room. He remained sitting for a few seconds before he carried out his promise.

 

/=/=/=/=/=/=/

 

Meanwhile, Donna went into her room. She closed the door and leaned against it. “'It's about trust, respect for what the other brings and their unique traits, and bringing out the best in each other', she recited her words to the Doctor. “'It feels right to be with the person, and you make the decision daily to be a loving partner to them.'”

 

Her eyes widened before she closed them tightly with a wince. “You've gone and done it, Donna. Fallen into real love with an alien who might not be capable of returning your feelings. What the hell am I going to do other than keep quiet?”

 

She looked up at the ceiling. “Don't ever tell him, Sweetheart. I don't want him to think poorly of me. He's the only man outside of my family who's treated me well, like I really matter. I can't be putting him on a pedestal like Lucie once did. And he can't know that I think he's dazzling.”

 

A quiet chime answered her.

 

“I hope that was an agreement,” she whispered.

 

/=/=/=/=/=/=/

 

While Donna was thinking aloud in her room, the Doctor had finished with the cleanup and walked back to the Control Room. Once there he sat in the Jump Seat that doubled as a reading chair.

 

“That's quite the picture of love that Donna painted. Care for another's well-being over your own, and wishing for their company? I know I've come to appreciate some companions' company more than others. Sarah Jane comes to mind. Grace could have been one had she agreed to come along with me. And Lucie, for all her youth, was one of them. Who knows what she would have become had she lived? Surely someone even more extraordinary.”

 

He stood, needing to walk around the room. “But why would I react so strongly to thinking Donna was dead? Why did I feel so panicked when she wanted to leave? And why was it so easy to think of her being my choice to become my wife?”

 

His voice slowly trailed off and his feet slowed to a stop. His eyes widened even more than they ever had during his Fourth incarnation.

 

“Oh,” he whispered, feeling the juggernaut hit him mentally.

 

He vaguely heard the TARDIS making tinkling sounds, like she was laughing at him for being thick.

 

The Doctor covered his face with his hands and rubbed his head hard. “Oh, Eternals! How could I? Would the High Council try to prevent it? They made me leave Sarah Jane because... they feared how close we were getting. Is she the one Ohila foresaw? Is that why she reacted so strongly to Donna? And even if I could convince my people to accept it, what about Donna's wishes? Ohila said she could help Leela and Andred have a child, but will that work? Is that the family River referred to? Donna has been the most understanding of all of my companions, the one who pushes me to be my best. But... what does she want? Could she possibly...? And do I dare ever say anything? I can't now. We're both too emotionally raw, and after what she's been through that would make me no better than what I accused River Song of being.”

 

He dropped his hands to his sides, sinking back into the chair. “What do I do? I can't lose her. Not yet. She must be the companion Ohila meant when she said a loss will trigger this me's death. But what does Donna want? And how can I ask? And what if loving her makes things worse? What if it turns into the cause of her death?” he finished on a whisper.

 

He was so lost in thought that he failed to see the growing hint of green appearing in the Rotor. The Moment was listening in, and she was furious. But she made the light fade when the Doctor looked up again. She did not want him to notice her noticing.

 

**THE END**

 

**TO BE CONTINUED IN “Chasing Unicorns and Wasps”**


End file.
